Pack
by Cleo Calliope
Summary: 'Where My Homage is Due' - Story 1: Greg Lestrade is a newly promoted Detective Inspector who, despite his natural dominance, has never wanted to be a Pack Leader with all it's incumbent responsibilities. A junky, a serial killer, and a shadowy government type may just make him reassess his priorities. (An Omegaverse story)
1. Chapter 1

_This summer I wrote short story. Then, when time came for this year's National Novel Writing Month, that story's sequel kind of took over. This is the result. And yes, I DID win NaNoWriMo. 50,000 words in one month! God help me._

* * *

><p>Chapter 1<p>

"The kid's as high as a kite."

Detective Inspector Gregory Lestrade sighed, nodding at the officer who had just reported that they had caught an intruder on their crime scene. As he headed back into the house he could hear the argument before he even entered the room next to the one the body was in.

"Look you..." said one of the officers, clearly angry.

"Are you all completely blank?" demanded an imperious voice, the tone and accent nearly screaming public school and money. "The idea that the brother could possibly be involved is preposterous! Haven't you checked for the documents? They're probably under the victim's mattress. He clearly wasn't the imaginative type. For pity's sake, look how his desk is arranged."

Entering the room Greg saw that the young man who had been pressed into a chair with no fewer than three officers around him was indeed little more than a kid. In his early twenties at the most, he was skinny to the point of emaciation with deep circles beneath his eyes. He was jittery with whatever it was he'd taken; hands never still. A mop of black curls hung into nearly colourless eyes which were bloodshot but still startlingly piercing when they turned on Greg.

The kid looked him up and down as though sizing him up before speaking again, with a confidence at odds with his wild appearance.

"Only recently promoted. The fiancée isn't nearly as excited about you being a D.I. as she lets on. Probably worried about the extra hours you'll be working. You're marrying a beta even though you're a fairly dominant alpha because you don't want a whole pack of children at home to distract you from the job. In fact, you're not particularly interested in being a Pack Leader at all despite how hard you worked for this promotion because of the distraction the responsibly for your packmates would be."

Greg blinked. He'd suspected Ann wasn't as thrilled with his promotion as he himself was. It was also true that the fact that he would likely end up serving as Pack Leader to at least a few of those under his command who lacked other ties was, for him, one of the few downsides of his new position. But to hear it all laid out like that in a clipped, matter-of-fact tone from a junkie he'd never met before was...

He glanced at Jones, a long-time Sargent and a solid officer. The guy just shook his head indicating that he was as lost as Greg himself was.

"Piss off."

Greg would be the first to admit that it was somewhat lacking as a comeback. What it might have lacked in originality, however, it made up for in being truly heartfelt.

It took longer than Greg would have liked to deal with the kid. He would have hauled him down to the yard under suspicion of murder if the house's security hadn't clearly been bypassed by someone who knew all the codes. Even then, he debated whether or not the kid could have some complicity in the crime. He simply knew too damn much. Then again, he seemed to know too damn much about everyone and everything.

In less than a half an hour they all learned far more about each other's private lives than any of them wanted to know. And while Greg wasn't about to take some doped-up kid's word for it, he privately decided that he'd look into the possibility that one or two of his officers had something that needed hiding.

When they had finally managed to eject their unwelcome visitor from the crime scene, everyone set about work again with the stiff demeanours of those who knew that everyone around them knew things about them that they didn't want them to know. Greg was just thankful that he hadn't had anything particularly salacious to be revealed at this point in his life.

Everyone was attempting to convince each other that _no one _could possibly know that much about complete strangers.

Still, Greg was incapable of not heading upstairs as soon as he could and checking under the victim's mattress. The envelope of documents he found meant that the case was closed quickly enough for him to get home to Ann on time for once.

The kid had been right, the brother had not been involved.

~0~0~0~0~0~

The second time the kid turned up was after the body had been taken away. The forensics team was just packing up and Greg was taking a final walk through of a mid-level solicitor's office. He found the kid studying a bit of frayed carpeting in the corner of one of the partners' offices.

Two weeks wasn't nearly enough time for Greg to have forgotten him. In the small office, without lots of others to fill up the space with their pheromones Greg got his first real scent of him. It turned his stomach. There wasn't simply the chemical tang that many of the cheaper drugs left about someone. He was also clearly using some kind of low grade suppressant and likely a kind of cheap synthetic pheromone masker as well. The result was an unpleasant alpha-ish scent, heavy on the chemicals. It reminded him a little of the cheap perfume one of his elderly aunts had worn, smelling of chemical based vanilla. You could tell what it was supposed to be, but what it really was was headache inducing.

"You didn't smell this bad last time," he observed. He was sure if the kid's scent had been this offensive he would have noticed.

The kid shrugged up one shoulder, broadcasting disinterest.

"I was down near the docks earlier where everyone uses those cheap synthetic maskers. I wanted to pass for a new arrival who was down on his luck. Your officers are useless and your forensics team isn't much better."

Greg perched on the edge of the desk with his arms folded, watching the kid as he knelt down in the corner and began tugging at one side of the carpet. He should, of course, either be arresting him or booting him out. But the evidence had already been collected and after the last time Greg could admit to a certain amount of curiosity.

"Why would you want to pass for an easy mark down by the docks? It's a good way to get yourself knifed."

The kid half-turned at that and flashed one colourless eye and half a quick grin. "To find out about a smuggling ring down there."

A lecture about allowing the police to do their job, leaving things to the professionals, and personal safety was on the tip of Greg's tongue. He bit it back as he was fairly sure that at best he'd get an eye roll. If this kid was going to listen to the police he wouldn't be inside a posted crime scene illegally. Greg wondered if there was a pack to appeal to but found he doubted it.

In the end, it was the innate curiosity that had made Greg want to be in the CID in the first place that formed a reply.

"And?" Greg asked as the kid went back to tugging at the carpet.

"Early days," he said dismissively. "Ah!" At that a whole portion of the carpet came up smoothly. Greg opened his mouth to object to the destruction of property before he saw that this section of the carpet hadn't actually attached to the wall or floor. Reaching under the kid pulled out a file folder and held it up triumphantly.

"Okay, how?" Greg asked, snatching it from him before the kid could open it.

"Simple," he answered, crowding over him as Greg sat down in the squeaky office chair and opened the folder. "The wear on the carpet clearly shows that someone walked over to that corner more often than to the window on the other side of the room and only slightly less often than to the desk. Why would someone walk over to a blank corner so often? If they had been walking to something that had once stood there, there would be indentations in the carpet. There are none. What there is, is a frayed spot at the edge of the carpet, a sign of neglect that nowhere else in this office shows. That something was then hidden beneath that carpet edge was obvious."

No, it wasn't obvious, Greg thought, but it made sense and was decidedly clever. The kid was observant and smart. It was a shame he was frying that excellent brain of his with whatever drugs he was taking.

"Your victim was killed because he discovered the firm's illegal activities," he said, pointing over Greg's shoulder at the first page.

"I'd like to look through all the evidence before jumping to a conclusion, thanks," Greg said, closing the folder and carefully bagging and tagging it.

"And _then_ you'll jump to conclusions," came the sour rejoinder. "The question is why would they leave the evidence in so obvious a place when they killed him, knowing that the police would search the premises?"

It was a valid question and the way he'd found the files had been clever. Of course, Greg's men _should_ have found it themselves and he'd be having a word with them about that.

He sat back in the office chair and looked up at his crime scene intruder.

"I had to take disciplinary action against one of my officers last week," he said conversationally. The kid shrugged, disinterested and started poking through the filing cabinet behind the desk. "You were right, he does have a methamphetamine problem. Takes one to know one?"

"I wouldn't touch meth if you paid me," the kid stated derisively.

"So what are you on?" Greg asked.

"Cocaine. Sometimes morphine," was the nonchalant answer.

"Jesus." Greg shook his head. "A brain like that and you're frying it with chemicals?" He didn't bother waiting for an answer. He'd known far too many addicts over the years to think that anything he said would make a difference. "What's your name?"

The kid turned to look at him, eyes narrowed. "I don't have a record."

Greg just waited.

"Sherlock," the kid said finally.

"Seriously?" Greg asked, surprised. That was a new one.

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "It's a family name," he said, diving back into the filing cabinet.

"And if I try to find your family?"

"I'm over eighteen. I can do as I please."

Which answered that question.

"Where do you live?"

A brief glimpse of a pale, suspicious eye. "Wherever I want."

Streets then. Despite the kid's – _Sherlock's_ – clean cut appearance, Greg had suspected as much.

The filing cabinet was slammed shut as though it had somehow offended its searcher.

"Why would they leave those files? Yes, yes... of course! Not only was this not planned but the person who killed him didn't know that the files were there. Someone who knew enough to realize they had a problem but not so in on it as to know where the files are kept. But someone who _thinks_ he's far enough in to make big decisions on his own.

"Your murderer, Detective Inspector, is one of the junior staff. Someone likely of limited intelligence but who believes themselves to have a great deal more mental faculties than they, in fact, do. An all too common failing. Someone with a quick temper who has a history of rash, ill-advised behaviour. He also thinks that his bosses rely on him when, in fact, they merely make use of him. He will likely have already made himself disagreeable by quoting the law at officers and looking down his nose at them. He will have an inflated sense of his own importance and may honestly believe that he is untouchable simply because he is a solicitor. When put under pressure, however, he will roll on his bosses without much provocation. Make him believe you have him wrapped up, that you know he did it and can prove it. He'll crack in less than an hour. Probably within fifty minutes."

While talking Sherlock had paced the office, waving his hands to punctuate his points. It all made perfect sense, Greg realised with more than a bit of surprise. It was a lot to get simply by finding some files under the carpet, but when put that way it all seemed entirely obvious.

Sitting in the office chair watching this bizarre junkie describe their murderer in detail was one of the oddest experiences of Greg's life. It was also, he realised, one of the most exhilarating.

Sherlock stopped pacing and looked around the room again.

"Dull," he declared. "There was no real challenge in this at all."

With that he swept out of the room. Greg let him go, wondering what he was doing even listening to a junkie. Still, he was sure he knew who the murderer was now. Sherlock was right, one of the junior members of the firm had already made himself far more unpleasant than was necessary and there had been something distinctly slimy about him.

It took forty-one minutes and 15 seconds to break the junior associate and won Greg twenty quid from one of his sergeants who hadn't agreed that he could be broken in under an hour.

Once again, Greg got home on time. He used the money to treat Ann to a movie.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

As spring stretched into summer the sight of a gaunt figure under a mop of unruly dark curls became an all too familiar one around crime scenes.

And he was always Greg's problem, no one else's. He'd shown up at the crime scenes of a few other DIs but only Greg was an idiot enough – according to his colleagues – to encourage him.

Twice Greg had been informed that "his junkie" had been arrested at someone else's crime scene. What was odd about both cases, however, was that he'd been out again before Greg could go down and ask him what happened. Literally within an hour of being picked up there was someone there with all the paperwork to get him back out again. It was actually kind of creepy. You'd have thought he had some powerful family looking after him, which Greg could have believed from the way the kid talked and acted. However, homeless junkies didn't normally have family. At least, not family they could find or would acknowledge them.

However, when Sherlock turned up again at one of Greg's crime scenes all of Greg's questions regarding this oddity were ignored. Sherlock clearly had no intention of saying anything about it. But had there been the faintest flush to his cheeks, a fleeting expression of embarrassment on his too pale face?

Greg honestly wasn't sure. He filed it away nonetheless.

It was only at Greg's crime scenes that Sherlock could come and deduce unmolested. Everyone thought Greg mad for that, but the fact was that the kid was unbelievable. His intellect was staggering and his ability to put the pieces needed to solve a case together quickly and efficiently was unlike anything Greg had ever seen before, ever even imagined.

When he explained his methods, why he knew who was responsible or where the evidence they needed could be found, it all seemed so absurdly simple. And yet Greg knew he couldn't have got there nearly so quickly himself, if at all. He didn't know anyone else who could. It wasn't that Greg wasn't good at his job, he would never have got the promotion to Detective Inspector if he hadn't been.

Sherlock, though, Sherlock was something else altogether.

As the summer wore on into autumn, though, it became harder and harder for Greg to ignore the fact that Sherlock was destroying the very thing that made him so extraordinarily unique. Being a cop meant dealing with junkies and Greg knew better than to think that there was anything he could do. Junkies did what they were going to do. Period. But the thought of Sherlock ruining that amazing mind like that was something that was starting to eat at him more and more.

He mentioned it, even made offers of assistance. Sherlock simply pretended he hadn't said anything at all when he did.

Unfortunately, Greg simply couldn't do any more than that. As long as Sherlock was unwilling to change there was nothing more anyone could do.

~0~0~0~0~0~

"Greg, can I talk to you for a moment?"

Greg turned to see his DCI leaning out of his office.

"Sure," Greg said, turning back around toward the office he'd just passed.

Detective Chief Inspector Chamberlain was a good man, and a damn fine officer, someone Greg both respected and admired. Which was more than could be said for some of those farther up the yard's food chain. As he shut the door behind Greg, the DI got the impression that his superior was honestly worried about something.

"Everything alright, sir?" he asked.

"I'm not sure." Chamberlain sat behind his desk and motioned for Greg to take a seat as well. "Any of your cases in the last few months looking like they might have been political?"

Greg blinked as he took a seat and shook his head. "Not that I'm aware of."

Chamberlain frowned. "I was afraid you'd say that. Look, I don't know what's going on but it seems that someone in the Home Office has been asking about you."

"The Home Office?" Greg asked, confused.

"And not just asking about you," Chamberlain continued. "It seems that without anyone bothering to tell me about it, someone over there ordered a complete copy of your records and case history a couple months ago."

Greg sat up, startled and more than a bit uneasy. "Why am I only hearing about this now?" Greg demanded.

Chamberlain spread his hands, helplessly, his frustration evident. "I didn't even know about it until now. I just found out today that my evaluations of you had been accessed. I've been doing my best to find out what the hell is going on but so far I'm not having much luck. Everyone is being really close-lipped about this."

Greg swore. "Look I have no idea what this could be about. I'll start reviewing my back cases right away, though. If there was some political angle to something that I missed, I'll find it."

Chamberlain nodded. "I'll continue to do what I can from this end. I don't like it when people start taking a hard look at one of my officers and I sure as hell have no patience with it being done behind my back." His frown had grown positively fierce as he glared down at the report lying open in front of him and Greg was reminded of the reputation the man had had when he'd still worked the streets. He was protective of his people even now and Greg didn't doubt there would be some serious words had on some rather high levels about this.

"The name 'Holmes' mean anything to you?" he asked, focusing on Greg again.

Thinking about it, Greg had to shake his head. "I don't think so. Why?"

His DCI shrugged. "It was a name that came up when I was asking about all this. But as soon as I tried to ask more about who 'Holmes' was I was shut down damn fast." He pierced Greg with one of his stern looks. "Whoever Holmes is, it's someone with a hell of a lot of clout to be able to go over my head like this regarding one of my own officers and to have everyone upstairs keeping their mouths shut. Look over your cases starting maybe four or five months ago and be careful. I don't know what this is about, but if it's big enough for someone like the Chief Superintendent to go over my head like this it's dangerous as hell."

Greg nodded, accepting both the warning and the dismissal.

Greg had no idea what he'd stumbled into but he was damn well going to find out.

~0~0~0~0~0~

The call had come at nearly midnight, rousting Greg out of a nice warm bed and into a chilly night. The wind had blown the rain clouds of earlier in the day away, leaving a clear sky and plummeting temperatures in their wake.

Detective Sargent Jones was waiting for him when he arrived on scene.

Greg had always found old train tunnels from the nineteenth century picturesque, but under the harsh florescent lights of the crime scene teams they just looked sadly worn. It wasn't the first time he'd been down here because of a body. Back when he'd been in uniform he'd been down here plenty of times to help with removal of an OD or a sidewalk sleeper who'd died in the night. The look on Jones' face was enough to tell him that this wasn't going to be anything like those times.

"Couple of homeless kids found the body about an hour ago. They were looking for someplace out of the wind to sleep."

As he approached the scene a uniform hurried passed him to be violently ill.

The stench of blood and waste was palpable even before Greg reached a small alcove formed by two brick walls not quite meeting. At first glance Greg couldn't even tell what the sex the poor sod had been, never mind permutation. The face was largely unmarked but so smeared with blood and contorted in fear and pain that beyond the fact that the individual had been young and Caucasian, there was little else he could determine. Below the face...

"Jesus Christ," he whispered, feeling his gorge rise.

"Eviscerated," Jones acknowledged grimly. He motioned to where one of the coroner's crew was crouched over something he couldn't see from this angle. He could, however, see the pool of blood spreading out from it. "What's still here is over there."

Despite his years on the job Greg had to swallow several times before he was sure he wouldn't be ill. There were some things you never got used to. Then again, he was firmly of the opinion that the day murder didn't affect you was the day you were no longer fit to serve as an officer of the law.

Looking over the coroner's shoulder he could see a pile of entrails and less easily identifiable internal organs.

"Is it all here?" he asked.

The man shook his head. "No, the reproductive organs are entirely missing. She was either a beta or an omega but we'll probably have to use blood tests to figure it out. There's nothing here to tell me one way or another."

"Shit," Greg muttered. "The press will be screaming about there being another Jack the Ripper around in no time. Right," he said turning to his men. "We have a hell of a mess to get through. Let's work the scene."

~0~0~0~0~0~

It shouldn't have surprised him that they had barely started before a uniform hurried up to him to tell him that they had caught an intruder.

Heading back over to the alcove from where he'd been discussing the body's removal with the coroner's team he was unsurprised to find Jones standing guard over a petulant Sherlock.

Jones just shrugged helplessly as Greg approached.

"How did you get here so fast?" Greg demanded.

Sherlock gave him a disdainful look, which served to remind Greg that Sherlock himself was homeless. Greg was in his territory now.

"Her name was Cynthia," he said flatly. His voice had lost something of it usable acerbity. Instead, he just sounded tired. "At least that's what she went by and I'm fairly sure it was her actual name. She never mentioned her last name that I know of. She was sixteen or maybe seventeen..." He seemed to think about it. "No, I'm sure she would have been sixteen. By her accent, she came from Milton Keynes. I didn't really know her as such. She kept mostly to herself, hadn't joined one of the local packs but wasn't ostracised by them either. Hadn't been on the streets long, only about two months or so. Didn't use. Didn't cause trouble. She did turn the occasional trick but she wasn't a pro."

Oh hell, Greg thought. He'd never seen the boy so subdued as he was now, standing over the body of a girl he barely knew. He suddenly seemed very young. All the more so because he was trying to hide that this affected him at all. Greg wanted desperately to pull Sherlock away from the body but knew also that he wouldn't be thanked for it. He doubted acknowledgment of Sherlock's distress would be met with anything but hostility.

There was a beat of silence where Greg searched for something to say before Sherlock seemed to pull himself together and began his usual rapid-fire deductions regarding the kind of scalpel used, the level of medical knowledge the killer would have to have had, and the kinds of containers best suited for carting someone's internal organs away.

Greg jotted it all down in his notebook as quickly as he could. While most of his fellow officers might prefer to ignore the theories of a junkie, Greg had learned not to discount what Sherlock said. He was usually right and at least at this scene he wasn't actually high.

When he wound down Greg looked up from his notebook. "What was her permutation?"

Sherlock's lips thinned as though he didn't want to answer the question. "She was an omega. Your killer either has an obsession with the ripper murders or with omegas in general. Either way, I'd expect another sooner rather than later if I were you."

Jones winced visibly.

"Another?" Greg demanded weakly. He'd thought the same about the similarities to Jack the Ripper but jumping to the conclusion of a serial killer this soon seemed a bit premature.

"This was clearly directed against her as an omega rather than as a person," Sherlock snapped. "The killer didn't care who she was, just what she was. He killed her but all the violence was directed against that which made her an omega. Therefore, if this was against an omega rather than Cynthia herself it's logical to conclude that whatever drove the killer to do this will drive him to do so again against another omega."

Greg wished – he _really_ wished – that he didn't see the logic of that.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

Sixteen-year-old Cynthia Harrison had run away from her abusive family in Milton Keynes some two months before. Like most omegas on the streets she had turned up at walk-in clinics regularly for the hormone inhibitors which would decrease her natural scent – which would have nearly screamed fertile omega available for breeding otherwise — and, more importantly — would keep her from going into heat. She had no record, no known enemies, and – what was rather dangerous – no bondmate, protector or pack. Being a young omega it wasn't safe to be without anyone to stand as protection against predatory alphas.

Still, while the threat of rape was very real for a girl in her position, this was the first time Greg had ever seen one eviscerated.

The coroner confirmed that only her reproductive organs were missing and – like Sherlock had said – the killer had some decent medical knowledge and had used a scalpel for both slicing her throat and the removal of her organs. Decent medical knowledge did not, however, seem to translate into the perpetrator being a doctor in this case. Again, Sherlock's deductions that the organ removal itself was too clumsy for an actual physician was born out in the autopsy. Not that Greg had expected any different. By this point he'd found taking Sherlock's pronouncements as gospel from the start and not bothering to wait for expert confirmation before following up on those the leads the kid provided generally lead to closing cases faster.

This case, unfortunately, was clearly not going to be like that.

It was a nightmare with no leads in sight and every day that went by without any progress was one more day closer, Greg was sure of it, to another crime scene like the first. While it was too soon to start talking about serial killers here in the yard, Greg knew in his gut that, as usual, Sherlock was right. This hadn't been a crime directed against Cynthia as a person, but as an omega.

The only good thing was that the press hadn't yet caught hold of the case yet. So far it was just the death of another homeless kid. It barely made the farthest pages back in the local news section and wasn't reported on at all outside of London.

He doubted very much that that state of affairs would keep after the next body was found.

~0~0~0~0~0~

The call came from Jones while Greg was getting ready to head to work one morning nearly two months after the murder of Cynthia Harrison.

"Sherlock was right," he said flatly before rattling off the address of a condemned block of flats.

This time Sherlock was already there when Greg arrived. He was clearly jittery, in desperate need of a fix but not actually high.

He was scowling at the uniforms that had actually managed to keep him from entering the scene. Greg decided to keep an eye on that lot, they showed promise.

A particularly nasty argument seem to be under way between Sherlock and one of the new officers who had just transferred into his division barely a week before. Donovan, he thought her name was. She seemed to be holding her own against him, which said a hell of a lot about her. He'd seen officers with far more experience than her beaten down by Sherlock in less time than it took Greg to get close enough to make out what they were saying.

"If you think I'm gonna let some junkie contaminate a crime scene…"

"As if you haven't already contaminated it," Sherlock snapped back. "Your skills as a police officer are…"

"That's enough, Sherlock," Greg called over.

Sherlock turned scowling over at him. Greg hadn't seen the kid in a couple of weeks and he looked worse than the last time. Thinner than ever, which meant he was little better than skin and bones, and Greg had to restrain himself from demanding to know when the kid had last eaten. It wasn't his business, he reminded himself. Sherlock was useful. That was all. Still, it was harder and harder these days to keep himself from trying to bundle Sherlock home with him to see him properly fed and clothed. And wouldn't Ann just _love_ that.

"Know who the victim is?" Greg asked as he approached.

"I haven't seen her yet," Sherlock scoffed. "I know of several possibilities though based on the location."

Greg nodded. He turned to Donovan and nodded toward Sherlock. "He's with me."

"Sir!" She was clearly scandalized by the idea but he just shrugged. She'd learn soon enough.

Sherlock smirked in victory as he swept under the crime scene tape with Greg. He saw Donavon — what was her first name again? Sofie? Sade? No. Sally. That was it. — take a deep breath as Sherlock passed, clearly still trying to figure out his permutation. Greg wished her luck with that. He'd known the kid for nearly eight months now and he still wasn't sure. He wore a bewildering variety of maskers and inhibitors so that he smelled different every time Greg saw him. Tonight he smelled like what Greg had come to think of as his default scent, an odd combination of a muted version all three permutations. It should have been jarring and unpleasant and Greg knew some of his officers found it so. He wasn't sure why he himself didn't. Oddly, he preferred it when Sherlock smelled entirely ambiguous than when he wore a strong alpha masker, which he did at times.

What he actually _was_ Greg didn't know. Although his personal theory was that he was one of those rare individuals with some kind of permutation ambiguity. It seemed likely that his obsession with covering his natural scent was that there was something wrong with it, something really off-putting. He was dominant enough that Greg wouldn't be surprised if the kid had a bit of alpha in him. But if he was an alpha it would have been odd for him to cover it up. An ambiguity or some problem with the pheromones he put off would answer the question.

Donovan was clearly disturbed by the confusion in Sherlock's scent and Greg heard her mutter "freak" under her breath as they walked away. It was said quietly enough that he decided that it probably wasn't worth it to call her on it.

Jones was waiting for them with the body, along with one of the crime scene team who was already carefully documenting the scene.

It was every bit as bad as the first. If anything it was slightly worse. The victim lay in the middle of what had likely been the living room of a flat back when the building was still in use. The removed organs, instead of just being piled to the side like before, had been spread out in an arch around the body.

"He enjoyed himself more with this one," Sherlock commented, walking carefully around the perimeter of the room. "He felt more secure here where he would have more easily heard anyone approaching. That combined with the experience of having got away with one murder already allowed him to relax and take his time, indulge himself in a bit of theatrics."

"Did you know her?" It was Jones who asked.

Greg couldn't help the surge of relief when Sherlock shook his head. "No, but she was a pro. That's obvious. I know who would know who she is."

It was not obvious, at least it wasn't obvious to Greg, that she'd been a prostitute. However, in this neighbourhood it wouldn't be surprising.

"Who works this area?" he asked Jones.

"I'll find out," the sergeant responded, heading out of the room with a look that said he was grateful to do so. Greg couldn't blame him.

Pulling out his notebook, Greg wrote quickly as Sherlock began to talk. The kid bent down for a closer examination of a couple of the internal organs, commenting on the level of skill necessary to remove them in one piece.

"But you're still sure this person wasn't a doctor of some kind?" Greg asked.

"No," Sherlock responded certainly. "You can see by the incisions here and here," he said grabbing a pen from the pocket of the crime scene tech to point at a couple of spots on what Greg was fairly certain was the liver. The tech had stopped taking pictures and was watching Sherlock with a mixture of horror and fascination. "This is clearly an expedient way of getting the organ out of the body. However, it is most certainly not how a doctor would go about this as there would have been no way for the person to survive such a procedure. While the killer has an excellent knowledge of human anatomy and a good deal of cutting experience, it is _not_ the kind where the individual being cut is expected to survive which is the main purpose of a doctor's incisions."

"But the killer didn't expect this particular person to survive," Greg argued. "Isn't it possible that they might have dissected the individual differently because of that?"

Sherlock shook his head. "If this had been done by a doctor, there would still be evidence of the standard methods of medical incisions. Those would have been drilled into them in the laboratory. They'd be second nature by the point they finished medical school. This person didn't study human anatomy with an eye to medicine. They studied it in order to best understand how to remove everything as quickly and efficiently as possible."

Greg couldn't help but make a face, more than a little disgusted by the thought. But he wasn't going to argue.

Just then Jones returned with a uniform who took one look at the scene and had to rush back out to be sick.

He returned only a few moments later, looking sheepish.

"Sorry, sir," he said, clearly embarrassed.

Greg shook his head and was about to tell the man not to worry about it but Sherlock spoke before he could reassure the officer.

"Ah, Constable Fitzhugh, good."

"Sherlock," Fitzhugh said, with a distinct lack of enthusiasm. Then he paused, looking confused. "What are you doing on a crime scene?"

Sherlock rolled his eyes but Greg jumped in before Sherlock could say anything.

"Constable… Fitzhugh, was it?" So, they weren't far from where Sherlock usually lived then, Greg thought, filing that bit of information away. He was not in the least surprised either by the fact that the officers who routinely worked this area knew who Sherlock was or that the man was less than thrilled to see him.

The officer nodded, turning his attention to Greg. "Yes sir."

"You work this area. Do you have any idea who our victim may be?"

Fitzhugh was clearly not happy to have to take a closer look at the body but he stepped forward anyway, looking carefully at the woman's face. Then his eyes widened in shock.

"It's Felicity." His voice was little more than a whisper.

"Any last name?" Greg asked, scribbling in his notebook. Fitzhugh seemed to shake himself out of the shocked horror.

"Sorry, I know it will be in our files somewhere. She's been picked up for solicitation and possession a few times. Felicity isn't her real name, but it's what she goes by. Her real name is Jemma something. I'll call in and have her files sent over to you." The constable looked back over at the body, pity showing clearly on his face now. "She had a mouth on her, that one," he said sadly. "A quick wit too when she wasn't strung out. Exchanged good natured insults with her more than once. She always took her arrests philosophically. She knew the score and wasn't much bothered when she had to spend a night in a cell. She wasn't a bad sort."

He understood what the officer was saying. Sometime you got to know the regulars and yes, some of them were right bastards who you wanted to see locked away. But others, you got to like in spite of yourself. He forced himself not to glance at Sherlock. Not for the first time, he reflected uncomfortably on what he would feel if he were called to a scene to find the kid dead. He was a homeless junkie after all. Either by overdose or murder, he was likely not to live very long. Greg pushed the thought away as unprofitable.

"What was her drug of choice?" Greg asked. Sherlock had continued poking about at the internal organs spread around the body with the borrowed pen during the conversation. He hadn't paid much attention to Fitzhugh except to smirk with clear self-satisfaction when Fitzhugh confirmed his deduction that the victim had been a prostitute.

At Greg's question, however, he looked up sharply. "It would have been Heroin obviously, don't be obtuse Detective Inspector."

The look Fitzhugh gave Sherlock was a mixture of surprise and resignation and Greg had to suppress a smile.

Fitzhugh seemed to pull himself together and turned back to Greg. "It was heroin," he confirmed. "I'll call my sergeant and get those files sent over to you."

Greg nodded. "Thank you constable."


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

Constable Fitzhugh had been as good as his word. By the time Greg finally got back to the yard the files on his newest victim were there waiting for him. Felicity's real name had been Jemma Pierson. Her mug shots showed a woman who had been rather pretty once but at 28 was starting to show the ravages of the life she led. Her hair had been badly bleached from her natural brown to a very unnatural blonde and she wore far too much makeup to cover the shadows under her eyes and the lines that had already begun to dig themselves into her face.

Nonetheless, there was something about the slight smile she had, even when going through the procedure of arrest that suggested someone who had retained her sense of humour despite it all. Her record was long but fairly monotonous: solicitation, possession, more solicitation, more possession. No violence or anything like it. Jemma Pierson had been a danger to no one but herself. Even then, the reports of arresting officers and prison guards all gave the picture of a clever woman with a sharp, sarcastic sense of humour. The kind of person you couldn't help but like, even when you were arresting her, exactly as Fitzhugh had described.

Like Cynthia before her, Felicity had had no pack. She'd used the standard suppressants to repress her heats and used her omega status to her advantage in her profession. She'd sometimes been homeless and sometimes had enough for a flop house or a room at a pay by the week hostel. There was no family. The only difference here was that Felicity seemed to have a great many friends and regular clients. She'd been arrested once in the process of buying heroin from one of her suppliers. The man had been taking in along with her and had spoken of her with obvious fondness.

As Greg pinned up her mug shot on the white board in the conference room he'd commandeered for this investigation, he felt unaccountably depressed by it all. It wasn't that he was usually unaffected by the murders he investigated. He was always affected. But there was something about the tragedy of Felicity's entire life, ending as it did at the hands of someone who clearly didn't even see her as a person. That got to him. She smiled slightly out of her picture now, unaware of the gruesome fate in store for her. A fate horribly illustrated by the crime scene pictures displayed next to her. On other side of the board, 16 year old Cynthia smiled shyly out of her own picture, next to the images of a ravaged body and a pile of internal organs.

He had to shake it off though. He didn't have time for this.

Jones sat at the table, going through the list of Felicity's known contacts just in case. Farther down the table another senior officer plugged away on a laptop, looking again for any like crimes. Greg had done such a search when they'd found Cynthia's body and he doubted there'd be anything to find this time. But procedure was procedure.

A quick breath, not quite a gasp, caught his attention and he looked toward the door. Donovan stood there. As the newest member of Greg's team it had been her Jones had sent to fetch coffee for them all. She'd left before Greg had put up the pictures and as she'd been canvasing the neighbourhood this morning and hadn't been a member of the team two months before, she'd never seen just what had been done to these two women.

"Pretty, isn't it?" he asked with sympathy.

Donovan straightened up, clearing her face of the shock of the moment before. Coming forward she quickly handed the other two officers their coffee before coming over to Greg and handing him his. He accepted the cup gratefully. Yard coffee was horrible stuff, but he needed the boost too badly to forgo it at this point.

Greg nodded toward the board. "What do you think?"

He hadn't really got the chance to get the measure of his newest officer yet. Though he appreciated her earlier display of backbone in the face of Sherlock's petulant wrath.

She folded her arms over her chest, studying the pictures. Her eyes were narrowed in concentration, the earlier horror gone.

"They're both omegas, right?" she asked.

"Yep," Greg answered, pleased that she now seemed entirely focused on the problem of the investigation. She'd felt the deaths when she'd come in, that was obvious. Something he wanted from any of his officers. But she'd clearly been able to put that aside to do the job. Another thing he expected from those under his command.

"So what's his angle then?" She seemed to be speaking to herself as much as to Greg. "Is he just completely obsessed with omegas in general or has he got a thing for the ripper or both?"

Greg nodded, pleased. "I've been wondering the same myself. In this case, I think it's more the first than the second. Our second vic was a known prostitute, sure, but we have no evidence that she'd been working last night."

"Right," Donovan nodded. "And based on where she was killed that kind of seems unlikely. That's not the kind of place you'd take a john. What about the first? I haven't had a chance to look at the file yet. Was she a pro?"

"Not really," Greg answered. He moved over to the table and pushed Cynthia's file toward Donovan who had followed him. "She'd only been on the streets for about two months and while we have information that she'd tricked a couple of times, she wasn't what anyone would call a professional."

"Just a runaway kid," Donovan said, flipping quickly through the file. "And she sure wouldn't have been tricking where she was found. All the ripper murders were done while the women were working the streets, crimes of opportunity. Not here. Think they were selected beforehand, stalked before they were killed?" she asked.

"It seems the most likely scenario," Greg confirmed.

Greg exchanged a look with Jones who nodded slightly in approval. This new officer was definitely going to be an asset to the team.

~0~0~0~0~0~

It was almost two weeks later when Jones caught Greg on his way back up to his office from questioning a suspect in a standard burglary gone wrong they'd caught a couple of days before.

"Sherlock's been arrested at one of Bradstreet's crime scenes. He was booked about ten minutes ago."

Greg rolled his eyes. Still, he'd wanted to talk to the kid about what he may or may not have heard regarding what the papers were already calling the Millennial Ripper. Greg's team had been doing their best but the prostitutes, homeless and junkies who had been those most likely to know anything in this case weren't generally eager to talk to the cops. Sherlock, as one of their own, was far more likely to get the information they needed. Greg hadn't seen him since Felicity's crime scene though and so hadn't had a chance to ask him. It was damn inconvenient not to be able to contact Sherlock himself.

If he got down to the cells quickly enough he could talk to him before whoever it was who always got him out arrived.

He nodded his thanks to Jones and headed down.

Sherlock sat on the bench at the back of one of the holding cells. He'd drawn in his knees up to his chest and was staring unhappily at nothing.

"What did you do to Bradstreet?" Greg asked. If anything, Greg had begun to think that the other DI might be considering making use of Sherlock as Greg himself had. She'd come by only a couple of weeks ago to ask what kind of help the kid was and had seemed genuinely impressed by what Greg had shared.

Sherlock shrugged, not looking up. "She objected to the fact that I was high and said she'd talk to me when I "sobered up". As if my deductions would be any more valid an hour from now than they were at the scene."

Greg leaned against the bars of the cell, watching the kid. Clearly he was coming down from the high, staring into space as though he were somewhere between being asleep and awake without the manic energy he'd probably had earlier.

"I'd have kicked you off my crime scene if you'd turned up high too," he said. "We might not be able to stop you from using but we sure as hell aren't going to have it shoved in our faces either."

Sherlock gave him a sour look.

Before Greg could say any more an officer showed up.

"Looks like you're getting out," he told Sherlock. "Someone's upstairs finishing up the paperwork as we speak."

Greg moved away from the cell as the officer unlocked it.

"That was fast. Who's doing the paperwork?" Greg asked, realising he might finally find out just who it was who kept getting Sherlock out of jail like this.

The officer shrugged, clearly not particularly interested. "I was just sent down to get him."

Greg nodded and followed them as the officer lead an unusually subdued Sherlock out of lock up.

At the duty sergeant's desk a young woman waited in a crisply fashionable suit. She looked cool and a collected and nothing at all like Sherlock.

Sherlock did not seem either surprised or pleased to see her.

Greg stepped forward.

"Who are you?" he demanded.

She eyed him for a moment before nodding to him. "Detective Inspector, my name is Antonia. I'm here to make sure the paperwork to release... Sherlock goes through.

Like hell your name is Antonia, Greg thought. Also, there had been a slight pause before she'd said Sherlock's name as though she'd been about to call him something else first and then thought better of it.

He snatched paper on the desk beside the desk sergeant and looked quickly through it. It was signed by the Detective Chief Superintendent.

Who the hell had the power to do that? Why would the super care about some junkie Bradstreet had picked up?

Just as he was wondering, Bradstreet stormed into the room, clearly furious. "What the hell is going on here?"

A tall beta with short blonde hair and a no nonsense attitude, of all Greg's fellow DIs she was the one he liked working with the most.

Greg handed her the paper and she swore.

"Who the hell are you?" she asked "Antonia". She received the exact same answer as Greg had. Word for word.

Antonia then turned to Sherlock who had been unaccountably silent throughout the exchange staring at the woman with a petulant expression. He looked pale and about to drop. The cocaine was well and truly out of his system now and the crash had to be hitting the kid hard.

"Well you sure as hell aren't making off with him before I…" Bradstreet began.

Antonia pretended not to hear her. She spoke to Sherlock for the first time. "If you'll come with me, there's a car waiting."

Sherlock seemed to pull himself with difficulty out of the funk he was falling into.

"I'm not going anywhere with you," he snapped with something like his usual acerbity.

"He's not going anywhere with anyone until I have a chance to talk to him," Bradstreet said marching over to stand between Antonia and Sherlock.

She was taller than Antonia and, to Greg's eye, far more attractive. Antonia's more ripe curves were far from unappealing but there was something about the smaller woman that put him off. She was too poised, too certain of herself. Too confident for a woman so young. Which meant that whoever was behind her has some serious clout. As if the super's signature on the order to release Sherlock wasn't enough sign of that already.

Who the hell had that kind of power and influence? And when had he wondered that exact same thing not that long ago? And he had wondered about it. He was sure of that. Something else had happened that involved someone with _a lot_ of power…

Then he remembered.

"Do you work for Holmes?" he demanded from Antonia, interrupting Bradstreet who had been reading the other woman the riot act. Bradstreet was not usually so volatile and he wondered what had put her in such a temper. It wasn't just this.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw Sherlock's head snap up. There was only a momentary look of surprise on Antonia's face. There and gone quickly as she schooled her features back to impassivity. Still, it had been there. And that explained how she'd known who he was. He tried not to grind his teeth.

Greg stepped forward. "I'd like you to tell Holmes that I don't appreciate someone going behind my back. If Holmes wants to know about me…" he paused, uncertain whether Holmes was male or female and decided to play the probabilities. "He can come and bloody well ask me himself."

Antonina eyed him coolly for a moment before nodding. "I will pass the message along Detective Inspector."

She looked back to Sherlock who just snorted.

She gave them all a cool nod before turning and leaving.

"What the hell was that about?" Bradstreet demanded.

"We'll talk in my office," Greg said. "Sherlock, you're coming too."

For once in his life Sherlock didn't argue.

Once in Greg's office Sherlock dropped into one of the visitor's chairs watching Greg with a look of serious trepidation, like he was suddenly unsure of him. Why, though, Greg couldn't imagine.

Bradstreet shut the door behind her and turned to eye Greg. "Alright," she said taking a deep breath before leaning against the wall. "Who's Holmes and what the hell is going on here?"

Greg shook his head. "I have no idea. All I do know is that someone accessed all my records not long ago. And I mean all of them. Records, case history, officer evaluations… everything. All DCI Chamberlain could get was the name Holmes, but when he tried to find out who that was he couldn't seem to get anywhere. It was like the name shut the mouths of anyone who might know anything. When I was looking at the fact that someone with a _hell_ of a lot of influence got the super to sign that release paperwork…" Greg shrugged. "It was a gamble but it paid off."

They both turned to look at Sherlock who had slumped down in the chair. The tension of a moment before was gone as though Greg's explanation satisfied him.

"Sherlock?" Bradstreet asked.

Sherlock said nothing for a long time, staring at the carpet at his feet.

"He works for the government," Sherlock said at last. The two Detective Inspectors waited but nothing more was forthcoming.

"I think we got that much," Bradstreet said, taking the seat next to Sherlock's. "What does he have to do with you?"

Sherlock shrugged. "He... I'm a genius. He wants me to work for him."

That, Greg was sure, was less than half the story. Not that someone within the government having their eye on Sherlock would be a shocking idea, but this was far more than just a recruitment attempt.

Sherlock sat up slightly and looked at them both. "That's all I'm saying. He's… he has power. He's dangerous. You don't want anything to do with him."

"Well, it's a little late for that," Greg said. "He's been in my business ever since I started working with you."

Bradstreet groaned. "I guess that's something for me to look forward to. Joy."

Sherlock seemed to take a moment to process what she'd said. He blinked at her before pulling himself together with clear effort. The smirk he gave Bradstreet didn't have a half of its normal smugness.

"It's taken you long enough to…"

Bradstreet cut him off. "I went through what you gave me at the scene and what I could look into of it so far checks out." She pulled a PDA out of her pocket. Unlike Greg, who preferred his old-fashion notebook, Bradstreet was a gadget freak. "What else?" She gave Greg an apologetic look. "Sorry but I want to get what I can before he's totally useless."

Greg nodded agreeably waving at her to continue while Sherlock sputtered that he was _never _useless.

It took only another ten minutes for Bradstreet to get what she needed from Sherlock. It was an odd robbery, someone had managed to get into a jewellery store and make off with a lot of jewellery in the middle of the day with no one seeing anything. Just the kind of thing that would catch Sherlock's interest.

When she was done she looked to Greg again. "So, what should I expect from this government agent?" she asked.

Greg shrugged. "All I know is what I've already said. He got all my records, and I mean _all_ of them. Even the stuff that no one outside of the yard is supposed to have access to. He went over Chamberlain's head to do it and he's pissed as hell about it. That's all I know."

Bradstreet sighed. "This is going to be fun." She turned back to Sherlock. "If you ever turn up at one of my crime scenes high again I'll ban you from it. And don't think I can't. But as long as you're sober, we can see how this goes. Do me a favour though. When you do show up, just tell the uniforms holding the scene who you are and to have them tell me that you are there. No more of this sneaking onto the scene business. If I want to keep chain of evidence I have to know who was where on scene at all times. It's bad enough I'm letting you on. If it gets out in court that there was unauthorised personnel on scene_ without_ us knowing exactly where they were and what they were doing at all times then any and all evidence gathered at that scene could be called into question. And I'm bloody well not going to see some murderer go free because you're arsing about. Got it?"

It was more or less the same agreement Greg had been trying to work out with the kid. Although, in his case he'd found waiting to see which uniforms caught him trying to sneak on and which hadn't was informative.

Sherlock looked petulant, but finally nodded before going back to staring at the carpet, glassy eyed.

The two Detective Inspectors eyed him with concern. They both knew the kid well enough to know that this was very, very wrong.

"He always like this when he's coming down?" Bradstreet asked, getting up to leave.

Greg shrugged. "I don't know. I've never actually watched him come down before."

"I do so _love_ being talked about as though I'm either deaf or absent," Sherlock snapped, a bit of his usual self showing through.

Bradstreet turned toward the door, not entirely able to hide the amused smile. "I'll see you later, Greg," she said. "And you Sherlock."

Greg gave her a nod.

She shut the door behind her when she left and for a while Sherlock and Greg sat in silence.

Greg turned in his chair to look out the window behind him. Evening was falling quickly and the wind had clearly picked up. There had been some flurries during the day but it was snowing in earnest now. He made a face. They were supposed to get as much as two maybe even three inches by morning and the temperature was going to plummet. By now the homeless shelters around the city would already be filled to capacity and it was going to be _cold_ out there with the wind on top of freezing temperatures.

He sighed. Ann was going to kill him.

"Come on," he said, getting up. Sherlock looked up clearly wary.

"Where?" he demanded.

"Look," Greg said pulling on his coat. "It's going to be bloody cold out there with heavy wind and snow. There's no chance in hell at getting a place in one of the shelters this late in the day and you're coming down from one hell of a high. If you think I'm going to let you go off in this to freeze to death in some alley somewhere you're out of your mind."

"I don't need your charity," the kid snapped.

"Good," Greg snapped right back. "Because you're not getting it. I need you for this damn serial killer case. And if having you as a resource for it means putting you up for the night so you don't freeze then so be it."

Sherlock didn't get up, just eyeing the DI and Greg wondered what he was seeing. It was often hard to tell with Sherlock just how much he could see. Sometimes it felt like he could read your thoughts. But there were other times when he simply failed to understand the strangest things. More than once when Greg had brought up the fact that he knew of good rehab centres Sherlock had snapped back that either he wasn't going to owe Greg any favours or that he could solve Greg's cases perfectly well as he was. As though the only reason Greg would want to help him was to have Sherlock owe him or to protect Greg's access to Sherlock's deductions. For all his brilliance he seemed honestly incapable of realising that Greg was worried about him.

He liked the kid, God help him. Lord knew what that said about him, but he did. He didn't want to see him dead either by freezing to death or overdosing and he sure as hell didn't want to see Sherlock destroy exactly the things that made him so incredible.

"Also, I need to pick your brain about the case and I'm too hungry to sit about here while the snow gets deeper and my dinner gets colder. The roads are going to be bad enough now. I don't want to know what they're going to be like in an hour or two."

This seemed to satisfy Sherlock. As long as the primary motivation for things was entirely selfish, Sherlock was far more comfortable with it than when there was anything altruistic involved. It made Greg wonder about his background. What kind of family had the kid come from that he couldn't see honest concern when it was right in front of him?


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

The roads where already bloody awful. The snow wasn't deep yet but the wind and the plummeting temperatures on top of the rain they'd got earlier in the day meant that everything was already icing over. Put that with the usual reaction of Londoners to snow and it was a madhouse out there. Greg passed at three accidents on his way out of the city centre. Luckily there were already officers on scene at each so he didn't have to stop.

Sherlock sat silently in the seat beside him, eyes closed. Greg wasn't sure if he was asleep or not. Either way he was so unlike himself like this that Greg debated taking him to A&E.

"I'm fine," Sherlock growled after a while.

"What?" Greg asked, started after the long silence.

"I said I'm fine," Sherlock repeated. "And besides the A&E would be packed at this point what with all the accidents and the mess."

Greg just shook his head. He didn't want to know how Sherlock had deduced exactly what Greg was thinking with his eyes closed. Still, it was good to know that he was still capable of deducing.

It took Greg nearly twice as long as it usually did to get home and it was only once they were actually there that he realised he'd entirely neglected to do one important thing. He hadn't called Ann to tell her they'd be having a guest. He groaned inwardly. Oh, _this_ was going to be fun.

Sherlock just smirked at him as they climbed out of the car as though he knew exactly what Greg was thinking. He probably did.

Greg lived in a comfortable row house far enough out of the city centre to be affordable but close enough in that the drive into work wasn't too bad. The neighbourhood was actually better than anything he and Ann should have been able to afford. Luckily, Ann was a real estate agent and knew exactly how to go about finding what was out there and snatching it up before it got on the market. This particular house was never even officially listed before they bought it.

It was a comfortable two story affair and Greg already felt the tension from the drive across town in the ice and snow begin draining from him as he looked at the warm glow of the lights behind the heavy velvet curtains Ann had inherited from her grandmother. He trudged up the walkway with Sherlock behind him and unlocked the door. It was warm inside and he could smell garlic and oregano wafting back from the kitchen along with the strains of classical music, something melancholy and sweet played by strings.

After the cold and dark outside it was like another world. A far better and more comfortable one. A gift.

Sherlock cocked his head. "Vaughn Williams," he said. "Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis." He cocked his head to one side listening. "Most likely the performance conducted by Andrew Davis."

Greg glanced questioningly at him as he unwound his scarf and hung it up with his coat.

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "The music," he said.

Greg just shrugged. He knew nothing whatsoever about classical music. That was Ann's thing. Although since marrying her he'd come to appreciate it more and more. He didn't know who the composers where or what the styles were. All he knew was that in the three months since the wedding it had begun to sound like home to him.

Now that they were there, there was another problem with having Sherlock here. The kid didn't exactly smell, as such, but he was clearly less than perfectly clean, his hair hanging into his eyes in slightly greasy clumps. He was far cleaner than you average homeless kid. Still, Ann, bless her, was more than a little OCD.

"Look," Greg said. "Why don't you go upstairs? The first door at the top is the bathroom. Get a shower and drop your clothes outside the door. I'll find something for you to wear while we wash them."

Sherlock just eyed him again, as though trying to figure him out before glancing around the entry way.

"If you wife is that fastidious…" he began, but Greg cut him off.

"It won't do you any harm to have a shower and some clean clothes."

When the kid still just stood there Greg growled, "Sherlock," in a warning tone. It wasn't a full alpha tone, he wouldn't have dared try to Command Sherlock to do anything. But then Greg didn't particularly like Commanding anyone if he didn't absolutely have to.

Command was something only an alpha could do and the strength of that Command depended on the dominance of the alpha. It was a combination of a particular growl with a particular set of pheromones that could compel others to do as they were told or at the very least stop what they were doing long enough to listen. It caused a knee jerk reaction to obey, the strength of that reaction being dependent upon the dominance of the alpha in question, the dominance of the person being Commanded and the relationship between the two. For the most part that knee jerk was all you got but that was more than enough in most cases.

In Greg case, his level of dominance meant that he could drop nearly any beta or omega to their knees with a single Command if it was given strongly enough. If he really tried he could even force a good few alphas to their knees as well. Even when he wasn't able to drop them, he could get anyone to pause, to stop whatever it was they were doing if only for a second. When he was chasing a suspect or trying to stop a situation from spiralling out of control, it was an extremely useful ability. That was, however, all he used it for normally. Greg wasn't comfortable with Command, he never had been. He wanted to earn the respect of those around him, not demand it. And he'd found that the fact that he _didn__'t_ demand it when he demonstrably could, the fact that he set about earning it, generally won him that respect a great deal faster. And when it was given that respect was, it seemed to him, more genuine than the deference with which most alphas of his level of dominance were treated.

Greg had never even considered trying to Commanded Sherlock. He knew, instinctively, that to do so would ruin whatever rapport the two of them had.

Still, when he spoke this time there was an edge of the Command growl even if there were none of the pheromones involved.

To his surprise Sherlock turned and headed up the stairs without further protest and Greg was a little taken aback. He would have expected another pithy comment or at least a look of contempt before Sherlock obeyed. He decided that it was probably because the kid was crashing hard.

Besides, at the moment he wasn't about to look any gift-horse in the mouth.

Heading to the back of the house he found Ann pulling garlic bread out of the oven while a pot of spaghetti sauce simmered on the stove.

Greg had always felt that what Ann lacked in curvaceousness she made up for with the well-crafted quality of the curves she did have. At 5'6" she was a good five inches shorter than Greg and he'd always rather liked that as well, liked how she fitted against him. Marriage was still new enough that he often found himself astonished to come home to find he had a wife. It was a marvel to him and he couldn't stop thinking about how damn lucky he was to have this. This evening, dressed in a green sweater and jeans, her red-gold hair pulled back in a ponytail, just the sight of her was enough to take away nearly all that still remained of the stress of the day.

She caught sight of Greg and smiled widely.

"There you are," she said. "It looks like it's getting nasty out there. I was just about to start worrying. How bad are the roads?"

Greg groaned exaggeratedly.

"That bad?"

She put the tray with the garlic bread on the counter and dropped the oven mitt beside it before coming over to slip her arms around Greg's waist.

He sighed, wrapping his arms around her and burying his face in her hair. She used strawberry scented shampoo and body wash and she smelled of both now with a hint of oregano. She smelled warm and clean and sweet. God, he loved her. He'd taken some flack for marrying a beta instead of holding out for an omega as a "true alpha" apparently would have. As far as he was concerned they were all out of their minds and Greg wouldn't trade Ann for a hundred omegas.

At that moment the shower turned on upstairs and she pulled back a little and looked up at the ceiling. "What…?" she began.

"Um, yeah," Greg said. "I'm so sorry, love, but with everything else I forgot to call you. I have a friend who I kind of said could sleep here tonight."

Ann sighed. "I really wish you had called." She glanced over at the stove. "I'm not sure I'll have enough to feed three of us, not with the way you eat." She hadn't pulled away from Greg, though, and that was a good sign.

"I know," Greg said, rubbing a hand up and down her spine in an unconscious gesture. "And I'm sorry but it was all kind of last minute because of the storm and what with worrying about the roads and getting home… I just didn't think."

"I suppose I can see that." She did pull away then, leaning up to give him a quick kiss before heading back over to check the sauce. "Who is it?"

This was the difficult part.

"Well… You remember I was telling you about that kid who's been helping me out on some of my cases?"

Ann stopped stirring the spaghetti sauce and gave Greg a narrow eyed look. "Sherlock," she said flatly.

Greg nodded, shoving his hands in his pockets and fighting the urge to fidget.

"Gregory Lestrade, are you saying that you brought a junkie into my house?" she demanded.

Greg wondered why it was always "their house" when she invited friends over for dinner and then suddenly her house when Greg did something in it she didn't like.

"Love," Greg said. "It's -7 out there. God only knows what the wind chill is now and it's only going to get colder. The news on the radio on the way home said that we might get as much as three inches of show by morning. He was helping Bradstreet — I've mentioned Bradstreet, right?" He barely waited for the nod. "Anyway, he was helping her with a case this afternoon. By the time they were done there was no way he'd have been able to get into any of the shelters for the night. What was I supposed to do? Kick him out into the snow on a night like this?"

Ann closed her eyes, clearly getting her temper under control.

"It's not that I don't understand wanting to help him," she said reasonably. "It really isn't. Obviously I wouldn't expect you to send him out to sleep on the streets in this." She opened her eyes again and pinned Greg with that piercing look she sometimes had. "And I know he's helped you a great deal. But the kid is still a homeless drug addict. How do we know he isn't going to make off with everything that he can carry while we're asleep?"

Greg shook his head. "He wouldn't do that." He held up a hand when Ann opened her moth to protest this statement. "Trust me. I know him well enough to know he wouldn't do that to us. Do you really think I'd bring anyone I believed would be a danger to us in any way into my territory? Into our _home_?"

All alphas were, by their nature, territorial. They protected what was theirs fiercely. Though Greg generally tried to live by reason rather than instinct, one area where he had no choice about allowing instinct its way was in the matter of territory. In the modern world, territory was a varying concept and could change depending on situation. An alpha's territory could be no more than a single room, as it had been when Greg was at university, or it could encompass entire neighbourhoods or even villages if the alpha was strong enough and the others in the area were willing to submit to his protection. Whatever the size or nature of his or her territory, though, an alpha would defend it without hesitation or question. It wasn't something that could be ignored. Territory was a visceral concept, something felt deep inside and the need to defend it and those within it was as basic as breathing.

The size of a territory often depended on the dominance of the alpha. As there were no other alphas close, besides a boy of six two doors down, Greg's personal territory, the area that was his to defend, encompassed not only his and Ann's house but also the homes of their neighbours on either side and the two houses beyond their immediate neighbour to the right.

He had no right to enter other people's homes, as that was their private space. He could and would only do so if he believed there was an immediate danger of some kind. However, he kept an eye on the area, made sure that things were as they should be.

It wasn't that he expected to know everyone who entered. They lived in a city, there were always going to be people who pass through that he didn't know. However he did need to know everyone who lived there and was there on a regular basis. It was simply the way society worked. The ever shifting loyalties and hierarchies that came with pack and individual territories was something everyone had to be aware of as they moved through their lives. All delivery people had to know who controlled the various territories on their routes and make sure they made themselves known to them. Greg could identify their mail carrier by scent, knew exactly when the milk was delivered and by whom. The later was particularly important and he had to be warned if someone else was going to be delivering to them. There was no end of damage that could be done to food and drink and if someone was going to be touching the milk of the two houses in his territory that had milk delivered, they were bloody well going to be someone Greg could identify the scent of. He knew the friends who visited often and when the nephew of the elderly widow next door had come for a week's visit, he'd come over the day he arrived to introduce himself and make sure Greg knew he was supposed to be there. When a contractor was hired the month before to do some work three doors down, he had come by the evening before work to make sure Greg knew who he was and what he was doing in his territory.

Greg's pack, since it only consisted at the moment of Ann and one of his junior officers at the yard, didn't have any territory beyond Greg's personal territory. Although, technically the flat where his officer lived would be considered part of Greg's pack territory. However, when the young man had signed the paper work that made him Greg's, Greg had gone over to the block of flats and met the alpha whose territory it was. Just so they knew who they each were and that they were, in a sense, sharing that particular flat. It wasn't an uncommon thing in the modern world so it was easy enough to handle. Besides, the officer was Greg's on paper only. They were pack by mutual agreement and the filing of paper work, nothing more.

After another moment Ann nodded, relaxing slightly. As with any alpha, Greg wouldn't allow just anyone into his personal territory. And he was even more careful about who would sleep under the same roof as he wife. He rarely acted the part of the dominant alpha, mostly because he didn't want to be treated any differently than anyone else. But he was who and what he was and that couldn't be put aside. If he'd chosen to bring Sherlock into his territory, and into his home, he trusted him enough not to harm anyone or anything that was his while he was there.

"I still don't like it," she said turning back to the stove.

The tone told Greg that there wouldn't be any more trouble on that point though and he headed into the laundry room to fetch something for Sherlock to wear while they washed his own cloths.

When he got upstairs the shower was just turning off and he knocked on the bathroom door.

"There's a pair of sweat pants and a t-shirt out here for you," he said, before heading into his own room to _finally_ change out of his damn suit.

~0~0~0~0~0~

When Greg got back downstairs, Sherlock was sitting at the kitchen table watching Ann while she finished cooking the pasta. She was, in turn, watching him out of the corner of her eye. The atmosphere was less than warm.

The t-shirt Greg had given the kid hung on him like a tent. Greg was much larger across the shoulders as well as being of a more healthy weight than Sherlock, who was little more than skin and bones. The kid's height, however, seemed to be entirely in his legs and the sweats didn't quite cover his bony ankles. Ann had clearly thought farther ahead than Greg and supplied Sherlock with a pair of Greg's socks. The socks only barely reached to where the sweats ended. The effect was incongruous and kind of cute. Sherlock always seemed so put together, remarkably so for someone living on the streets. So to see him in clothes that fit this badly was funny. As if he were finally seeing the kid without his armour. What was odd was that it was also strangely comfortable.

Still, it was… unsettling in a way to see Sherlock sitting in his kitchen. Unsettling, but somehow, oddly satisfying. It was snowing even harder now, the world white beyond the windows of his cosy little house. Ann had turned down the music to a mere mummer of sound in the background, the sound of the washing machine running in the other room adding a domestic counterpoint to whatever was playing.

Greg felt oddly content as he sat down to dinner with Ann and Sherlock. It should have bothered him to have Sherlock here. Sherlock was, as Ann had reminded him, a homeless junkie. Just some kid Greg had come across and couldn't, now, seem to get rid of.

The really strange thing about it, though, was that it wasn't until he was passing the vegetables to the kid that he realised he hadn't even stopped to think about it. He'd looked at the weather, realised the shelters would be full and decided then and there to take Sherlock home with him. He hadn't even stopped to consider it. The alpha instincts that governed territorial issues hadn't been bothered in the least by the idea of Sherlock under his roof for the night. In fact, he felt deeply pleased with the fact.

Why this should be the case was somewhat baffling and Greg decided that he didn't want to analyse that feeling too closely.

There were rules at the Lestrade house as there were in any. One of them was that business of any kind was not to be discussed at the dinner table. Greg and Ann talked about things that happened at work but both of them wanted to be able to put the jobs themselves aside while they ate.

Ann's attempts to get Sherlock to talk about himself did not bear fruit. More than once Greg saw the kid open his mouth to give some kind of sharp comeback but each time Greg gave him a look that made him bite back the retort. The fact that this was working, that Sherlock was actually allowing Greg to stop him from saying whatever the hell he wanted to say was… deeply strange. Greg had had no idea that he could influence Sherlock in anyway and he couldn't claim to understand what was happening. It was possible, of course, that it was because of where they were. It was hardwired into everyone that you respected an alpha's personal territory. But the instincts that guided most people's behaviour generally seemed absent from Sherlock and Greg found it hard to believe that just being in Greg's home would alter anything much.

Again, though, this was not a gift horse he intended to look in the mouth. As conversation seemed to lag, Greg decided to play a little game.

"Sherlock," he said. The kid looked up from where he'd been picking at his food more than actually eating it. "Did you get a look at the houses on either side of us when we got here?"

Sherlock eyed him warily. "Of course," he answered.

Greg grinned, turning to Ann. "I haven't told him a thing about our neighbours, ever."

"Okay," Ann said, clearly perplexed.

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "You want me to deduce them? It's not parlour trick."

Greg just kept smiling as he leaned back in his seat. "Well?" he asked, raising an eyebrow in challenge.

Sherlock sighed as though put upon but Greg saw his eyes light with both the challenge and the chance to show off. The kid could never back down from the opportunity to do either.

Ann sipped at her wine, looking with interest now.

"This is that thing you do at crime scenes?" she asked. "Where you know everything just by looking?"

"I simply observe and deduce from those observations. It's not hard but no one ever pays _attention._" The all too common complaint lacked a certain level of its heat though as his mind was clearly already on the challenge. He sat back then and closed his eyes, pressing his hands together beneath his chin, almost as if in prayer.

"The house on the left is that of an elderly widow. She has lived there for some time. More than ten years but less than twenty. Fourteen I'd say. She's lived there since before her husband… No, from before her _mate_ died. However, it is not where their raised their children. Nor was it a retirement home. They moved into it when he became ill to be close to family. Not her family, though. Children of his, from a previous marriage before he mated with her. She's older... probably in her seventies or eighties and while she is beginning to have some physical limitations she is far from incapable of taking care of herself. Still, you have been concerned enough about her recently that you not only have a key to her house but visit there often to check up on her."

Ann's wine glass hung forgotten in her hand as she stared at Sherlock, her lips slightly parted in shock. Her blue eyes opened wide in a way Greg found not only amusing but also rather captivating.

"On the other side is middle aged bachelor. While he acknowledges his home to be part of your territory, Lestrade, he is less than pleased by the fact that he cannot hold it himself. Beta, certainly. I doubt that the fact that he must be in the territory of an alpha is what bothers him though. His family while not as wealthy as they'd like to be thought, does have some certain... connections. Therefore, it is not so much that his home is in the territory of a neighbouring alpha that bothers him so much as the fact that he views you as socially beneath him and dislikes the fact that he is, by custom, in a somewhat subordinate position to you. I would imagine that it might not have been so bad, if you weren't obviously both as dominant as you are while being fairly careless about the fact. Those of his social rank often feel that an alpha as dominant as you are should stand on more ceremony with those around them.

"He particularly dislikes the noise of the children on the other side of him and the fact that you indulge them enough to allow them to come over and play in your garden as well as their own. A rather idiotic way to be as it is to be expected that any alpha would like to have the pups in his territory near whenever it is convenient for that to be the case. And as children, they would naturally gravitate toward you and want to be near you for the protection you would provide. That's simply instinct. This is exacerbated by the fact that she is a single parent trying to raise two... no, three boys. Therefore you are not only the alpha they would naturally took to for protection but, by extension, a sort of pseudo-pack alpha for them as their own pack alpha — not their father… an uncle perhaps? — does not live close enough to provide them with the sense of security they need. I imagine that he is also not particularly interested in being their pack alpha and has only taken on the role because of the ties of family.

"Because the boys so often come to play in your garden, it has caused some problems with the gentleman next door as they often do not take the long way around and instead routinely invade what he feels is his area. Not territory as he cannot hold territory but his particular part, his sub-territory if you will. There has been a great deal of trouble over this and it remains a standing argument between the three households."

Sherlock finally opened his eyes and look at them.

Ann still sat as she had before, seemingly frozen to the spot. Greg couldn't stop grinning. He felt ridiculously proud as if he'd had something to do with what Sherlock could do. It was stupid, but there it was. He'd told Ann about Sherlock, of course, but while she didn't _dis_believe him about what Sherlock could do, he could tell that she often felt that he was probably exaggerating a bit. Being able to show her once and for all that that was not the case was fun.

Finally, Ann seemed to breathe again and put down her wine glass. She glanced at Greg questioningly. He just shook his head. There was no trick here.

She smoothed her napkin over her lap. "Right," she said. "That was…" She seemed to think for a moment before looking up, pinning Sherlock with one of her piercing looks. "I know you probably have all kinds of… what did you call them? Deductions?" Sherlock nodded. "Alright. I'm sure you have many about me. If I ever hear you utter a single one of them you will be sorry. As long as that is understood… yes…"

She looked at Greg again, clearly still off balance. Then he watched her pull herself together. "Desert anyone?"

~0~0~0~0~0~

After Greg had helped clear the table and had gone to remove Sherlock's things out of the washer and hung them up to dry, Greg found Sherlock sitting on the couch staring at the empty fireplace. He'd opened the front curtains and the world was more or less white beyond the glass. The snow having finally covered everything and made them into nothing but vaguely defined shapes. It wasn't snowing as hard as it had been before but the wind caught what there was and whipped it into little cyclones and ephemeral, ghostly shapes.

Sherlock himself looked oddly small in the dim room. Vulnerable and young, in Greg's ill-fitting clothes in a way he'd never seemed before. His hair had dried in a profusion of utterly unruly curls. Looking at him safe, clean, and warm while just beyond him the wind was whipping through the icy world of the streets that were his home, Greg felt an unexpected lump in his throat. This was just for one night. He knew that. Tomorrow night, where would Sherlock be? Out in that icy world somewhere, trying desperately to keep warm through the long night ahead?

"I'm not helpless," Sherlock said flatly. "I have lived through winter on the streets before now. I'll survive this one as well. You needn't worry, I'll still be around to do your job for you."

Greg just shook his head. There was no point in either insisting that he was perfectly capable of doing his own damn job or that his concern for Sherlock wasn't based entirely on selfish urges.

Greg pulled the curtains closed over the vista of the white world beyond and began to build up the fire.

While he piled the kindling in and a couple of twists of paper to get the fire started they sat in a surprisingly comfortable silence. It shouldn't be but it was.

"What about your things?" Greg asked, the thought only just having occurred to him. "I'm sure you own more than just the clothes hanging up in the other room. Aren't you worried that you'll get back tomorrow and they won't be there anymore?"

"No," Sherlock said, clearly unconcerned.

Greg gave him a questioning look. "Why not?"

Sherlock shrugged. "I know people, people I help out. In turn they keep an eye on what's mine for me."

"Pack?" Greg asked, wondering for the first time if Sherlock did, in fact, have someone to look out for him.

"No," was the flat reply. Sherlock didn't elaborate further and Greg decided not to press.

When the fire was finally going, Greg stretched out in his favourite armchair. Ann stopped in to say she was going to have a bath and headed upstairs, leaving Greg and Sherlock to their strangely comfortable silence.

After a while, though, Greg roused himself from his contemplation of the fire to turn to Sherlock.

"I'd meant to ask you, have you heard anything? Any rumours about who may be responsible for the deaths of those two girls? It seems likely, that they were chosen beforehand, maybe even stalked. Someone may have seen something."

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "Of _course_ they were stalked, Lestrade, don't be stupid. The murderer certainly wouldn't have just happened to stumble upon either of them where they were at the times of their death."

"And?" Greg prodded when Sherlock didn't continue.

"No," Sherlock said finally. "No one saw anything, at least not anything other than what they'd expect to see. People come and go all the time, it's not like your little neighbourhood here with a set group of people and set schedules. Strangers are commonplace. Whoever our killer is he knows how to look like he belongs. City workers are through all the time. There's been some surveyors working near where the first victim died as there is talk, again, of trying to tear down part of the old brickwork there. They'll never get city approval for it but occasionally people try to see if they can. There's been some problem with the sewers not far from the second crime scene and there were workers there, in and out for at least a week before the death. The few newcomers to the area have been watched carefully, ever since the first murder. None of them seem to be involved, however. The packs have closed ranks and the omegas aren't being allowed to wander about by themselves."

"Neither of the victim's had packs," Greg pointed out.

"Yes, but the omegas living without packs are either seeking sanctuary with one of the local packs or leaving the area all together if they can. Three have banded together as a kind of pack, watching each other's back. I think we'll be waiting a little while before the next murder. It will be harder for the murderer to get an omega alone with everyone on high alert. Even harder with this weather that is keeping many in shelters they normally wouldn't frequent. The shelters themselves are giving preference to omegas, in concern that if they are denied a place they may be killed next. For once there's little enough grumbling about it. In fact, the alphas are insisting on it."

Greg nodded. It wasn't as though he'd been expecting much. He'd done a run of all city and municipal workers in the area himself and talked to most of them who spent any amount of time down there. He'd gone and talked to Constable Fitzhugh more about the area as well as any other officer who routinely worked down there.

He allowed the silent to fall again, oddly unwilling to press the farther with the case tonight. He was unexpectedly content just at the moment and found he'd rather keep the spectre of their killer out of this room. The house was warm, safe. Ann was soaking in the tub and when he looked a little while later, Greg found that Sherlock had dozed off on the couch. They were safe for now and murder seemed far away.

It could all wait for another day he thought. In a little while, he'd wake Sherlock and usher him up to the guest room. Then he'd curl up with Ann and sleep, content in the knowledge that both were safe under his roof where he could protect them.

They had time.

Unfortunately, for once, Sherlock was wrong.

The roads where already bloody awful. The snow wasn't deep yet but the wind and the plummeting temperatures on top of the rain they'd got earlier in the day meant that everything was already icing over. Put that with the usual reaction of Londoners to snow and it was a madhouse out there. Greg passed at three accidents on his way out of the city centre. Luckily there were already officers on scene at each so he didn't have to stop.

Sherlock sat silently in the seat beside him, eyes closed. Greg wasn't sure if he was asleep or not. Either way he was so unlike himself like this that Greg debated taking him to A&E.

"I'm fine," Sherlock growled after a while.

"What?" Greg asked, started after the long silence.

"I said I'm fine," Sherlock repeated. "And besides the A&E would be packed at this point what with all the accidents and the mess."

Greg just shook his head. He didn't want to know how Sherlock had deduced exactly what Greg was thinking with his eyes closed. Still, it was good to know that he was still capable of deducing.

It took Greg nearly twice as long as it usually did to get home and it was only once they were actually there that he realised he'd entirely neglected to do one important thing. He hadn't called Ann to tell her they'd be having a guest. He groaned inwardly. Oh, _this_ was going to be fun.

Sherlock just smirked at him as they climbed out of the car as though he knew exactly what Greg was thinking. He probably did.

Greg lived in a comfortable row house far enough out of the city centre to be affordable but close enough in that the drive into work wasn't too bad. The neighbourhood was actually better than anything he and Ann should have been able to afford. Luckily, Ann was a real estate agent and knew exactly how to go about finding what was out there and snatching it up before it got on the market. This particular house was never even officially listed before they bought it.

It was a comfortable two story affair and Greg already felt the tension from the drive across town in the ice and snow begin draining from him as he looked at the warm glow of the lights behind the heavy velvet curtains Ann had inherited from her grandmother. He trudged up the walkway with Sherlock behind him and unlocked the door. It was warm inside and he could smell garlic and oregano wafting back from the kitchen along with the strains of classical music, something melancholy and sweet played by strings.

After the cold and dark outside it was like another world. A far better and more comfortable one. A gift.

Sherlock cocked his head. "Vaughn Williams," he said. "Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis." He cocked his head to one side listening. "Most likely the performance conducted by Andrew Davis."

Greg glanced questioningly at him as he unwound his scarf and hung it up with his coat.

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "The music," he said.

Greg just shrugged. He knew nothing whatsoever about classical music. That was Ann's thing. Although since marrying her he'd come to appreciate it more and more. He didn't know who the composers where or what the styles were. All he knew was that in the three months since the wedding it had begun to sound like home to him.

Now that they were there, there was another problem with having Sherlock here. The kid didn't exactly smell, as such, but he was clearly less than perfectly clean, his hair hanging into his eyes in slightly greasy clumps. He was far cleaner than you average homeless kid. Still, Ann, bless her, was more than a little OCD.

"Look," Greg said. "Why don't you go upstairs? The first door at the top is the bathroom. Get a shower and drop your clothes outside the door. I'll find something for you to wear while we wash them."

Sherlock just eyed him again, as though trying to figure him out before glancing around the entry way.

"If you wife is that fastidious…" he began, but Greg cut him off.

"It won't do you any harm to have a shower and some clean clothes."

When the kid still just stood there Greg growled, "Sherlock," in a warning tone. It wasn't a full alpha tone, he wouldn't have dared try to Command Sherlock to do anything. But then Greg didn't particularly like Commanding anyone if he didn't absolutely have to.

Command was something only an alpha could do and the strength of that Command depended on the dominance of the alpha. It was a combination of a particular growl with a particular set of pheromones that could compel others to do as they were told or at the very least stop what they were doing long enough to listen. It caused a knee jerk reaction to obey, the strength of that reaction being dependent upon the dominance of the alpha in question, the dominance of the person being Commanded and the relationship between the two. For the most part that knee jerk was all you got but that was more than enough in most cases.

In Greg case, his level of dominance meant that he could drop nearly any beta or omega to their knees with a single Command if it was given strongly enough. If he really tried he could even force a good few alphas to their knees as well. Even when he wasn't able to drop them, he could get anyone to pause, to stop whatever it was they were doing if only for a second. When he was chasing a suspect or trying to stop a situation from spiralling out of control, it was an extremely useful ability. That was, however, all he used it for normally. Greg wasn't comfortable with Command, he never had been. He wanted to earn the respect of those around him, not demand it. And he'd found that the fact that he _didn__'t_ demand it when he demonstrably could, the fact that he set about earning it, generally won him that respect a great deal faster. And when it was given that respect was, it seemed to him, more genuine than the deference with which most alphas of his level of dominance were treated.

Greg had never even considered trying to Commanded Sherlock. He knew, instinctively, that to do so would ruin whatever rapport the two of them had.

Still, when he spoke this time there was an edge of the Command growl even if there were none of the pheromones involved.

To his surprise Sherlock turned and headed up the stairs without further protest and Greg was a little taken aback. He would have expected another pithy comment or at least a look of contempt before Sherlock obeyed. He decided that it was probably because the kid was crashing hard.

Besides, at the moment he wasn't about to look any gift-horse in the mouth.

Heading to the back of the house he found Ann pulling garlic bread out of the oven while a pot of spaghetti sauce simmered on the stove.

Greg had always felt that what Ann lacked in curvaceousness she made up for with the well-crafted quality of the curves she did have. At 5'6" she was a good five inches shorter than Greg and he'd always rather liked that as well, liked how she fitted against him. Marriage was still new enough that he often found himself astonished to come home to find he had a wife. It was a marvel to him and he couldn't stop thinking about how damn lucky he was to have this. This evening, dressed in a green sweater and jeans, her red-gold hair pulled back in a ponytail, just the sight of her was enough to take away nearly all that still remained of the stress of the day.

She caught sight of Greg and smiled widely.

"There you are," she said. "It looks like it's getting nasty out there. I was just about to start worrying. How bad are the roads?"

Greg groaned exaggeratedly.

"That bad?"

She put the tray with the garlic bread on the counter and dropped the oven mitt beside it before coming over to slip her arms around Greg's waist.

He sighed, wrapping his arms around her and burying his face in her hair. She used strawberry scented shampoo and body wash and she smelled of both now with a hint of oregano. She smelled warm and clean and sweet. God, he loved her. He'd taken some flack for marrying a beta instead of holding out for an omega as a "true alpha" apparently would have. As far as he was concerned they were all out of their minds and Greg wouldn't trade Ann for a hundred omegas.

At that moment the shower turned on upstairs and she pulled back a little and looked up at the ceiling. "What…?" she began.

"Um, yeah," Greg said. "I'm so sorry, love, but with everything else I forgot to call you. I have a friend who I kind of said could sleep here tonight."

Ann sighed. "I really wish you had called." She glanced over at the stove. "I'm not sure I'll have enough to feed three of us, not with the way you eat." She hadn't pulled away from Greg, though, and that was a good sign.

"I know," Greg said, rubbing a hand up and down her spine in an unconscious gesture. "And I'm sorry but it was all kind of last minute because of the storm and what with worrying about the roads and getting home… I just didn't think."

"I suppose I can see that." She did pull away then, leaning up to give him a quick kiss before heading back over to check the sauce. "Who is it?"

This was the difficult part.

"Well… You remember I was telling you about that kid who's been helping me out on some of my cases?"

Ann stopped stirring the spaghetti sauce and gave Greg a narrow eyed look. "Sherlock," she said flatly.

Greg nodded, shoving his hands in his pockets and fighting the urge to fidget.

"Gregory Lestrade, are you saying that you brought a junkie into my house?" she demanded.

Greg wondered why it was always "their house" when she invited friends over for dinner and then suddenly her house when Greg did something in it she didn't like.

"Love," Greg said. "It's -7 out there. God only knows what the wind chill is now and it's only going to get colder. The news on the radio on the way home said that we might get as much as three inches of show by morning. He was helping Bradstreet — I've mentioned Bradstreet, right?" He barely waited for the nod. "Anyway, he was helping her with a case this afternoon. By the time they were done there was no way he'd have been able to get into any of the shelters for the night. What was I supposed to do? Kick him out into the snow on a night like this?"

Ann closed her eyes, clearly getting her temper under control.

"It's not that I don't understand wanting to help him," she said reasonably. "It really isn't. Obviously I wouldn't expect you to send him out to sleep on the streets in this." She opened her eyes again and pinned Greg with that piercing look she sometimes had. "And I know he's helped you a great deal. But the kid is still a homeless drug addict. How do we know he isn't going to make off with everything that he can carry while we're asleep?"

Greg shook his head. "He wouldn't do that." He held up a hand when Ann opened her moth to protest this statement. "Trust me. I know him well enough to know he wouldn't do that to us. Do you really think I'd bring anyone I believed would be a danger to us in any way into my territory? Into our _home_?"

All alphas were, by their nature, territorial. They protected what was theirs fiercely. Though Greg generally tried to live by reason rather than instinct, one area where he had no choice about allowing instinct its way was in the matter of territory. In the modern world, territory was a varying concept and could change depending on situation. An alpha's territory could be no more than a single room, as it had been when Greg was at university, or it could encompass entire neighbourhoods or even villages if the alpha was strong enough and the others in the area were willing to submit to his protection. Whatever the size or nature of his or her territory, though, an alpha would defend it without hesitation or question. It wasn't something that could be ignored. Territory was a visceral concept, something felt deep inside and the need to defend it and those within it was as basic as breathing.

The size of a territory often depended on the dominance of the alpha. As there were no other alphas close, besides a boy of six two doors down, Greg's personal territory, the area that was his to defend, encompassed not only his and Ann's house but also the homes of their neighbours on either side and the two houses beyond their immediate neighbour to the right.

He had no right to enter other people's homes, as that was their private space. He could and would only do so if he believed there was an immediate danger of some kind. However, he kept an eye on the area, made sure that things were as they should be.

It wasn't that he expected to know everyone who entered. They lived in a city, there were always going to be people who pass through that he didn't know. However he did need to know everyone who lived there and was there on a regular basis. It was simply the way society worked. The ever shifting loyalties and hierarchies that came with pack and individual territories was something everyone had to be aware of as they moved through their lives. All delivery people had to know who controlled the various territories on their routes and make sure they made themselves known to them. Greg could identify their mail carrier by scent, knew exactly when the milk was delivered and by whom. The later was particularly important and he had to be warned if someone else was going to be delivering to them. There was no end of damage that could be done to food and drink and if someone was going to be touching the milk of the two houses in his territory that had milk delivered, they were bloody well going to be someone Greg could identify the scent of. He knew the friends who visited often and when the nephew of the elderly widow next door had come for a week's visit, he'd come over the day he arrived to introduce himself and make sure Greg knew he was supposed to be there. When a contractor was hired the month before to do some work three doors down, he had come by the evening before work to make sure Greg knew who he was and what he was doing in his territory.

Greg's pack, since it only consisted at the moment of Ann and one of his junior officers at the yard, didn't have any territory beyond Greg's personal territory. Although, technically the flat where his officer lived would be considered part of Greg's pack territory. However, when the young man had signed the paper work that made him Greg's, Greg had gone over to the block of flats and met the alpha whose territory it was. Just so they knew who they each were and that they were, in a sense, sharing that particular flat. It wasn't an uncommon thing in the modern world so it was easy enough to handle. Besides, the officer was Greg's on paper only. They were pack by mutual agreement and the filing of paper work, nothing more.

After another moment Ann nodded, relaxing slightly. As with any alpha, Greg wouldn't allow just anyone into his personal territory. And he was even more careful about who would sleep under the same roof as he wife. He rarely acted the part of the dominant alpha, mostly because he didn't want to be treated any differently than anyone else. But he was who and what he was and that couldn't be put aside. If he'd chosen to bring Sherlock into his territory, and into his home, he trusted him enough not to harm anyone or anything that was his while he was there.

"I still don't like it," she said turning back to the stove.

The tone told Greg that there wouldn't be any more trouble on that point though and he headed into the laundry room to fetch something for Sherlock to wear while they washed his own cloths.

When he got upstairs the shower was just turning off and he knocked on the bathroom door.

"There's a pair of sweat pants and a t-shirt out here for you," he said, before heading into his own room to _finally_ change out of his damn suit.

~0~0~0~0~0~

When Greg got back downstairs, Sherlock was sitting at the kitchen table watching Ann while she finished cooking the pasta. She was, in turn, watching him out of the corner of her eye. The atmosphere was less than warm.

The t-shirt Greg had given the kid hung on him like a tent. Greg was much larger across the shoulders as well as being of a more healthy weight than Sherlock, who was little more than skin and bones. The kid's height, however, seemed to be entirely in his legs and the sweats didn't quite cover his bony ankles. Ann had clearly thought farther ahead than Greg and supplied Sherlock with a pair of Greg's socks. The socks only barely reached to where the sweats ended. The effect was incongruous and kind of cute. Sherlock always seemed so put together, remarkably so for someone living on the streets. So to see him in clothes that fit this badly was funny. As if he were finally seeing the kid without his armour. What was odd was that it was also strangely comfortable.

Still, it was… unsettling in a way to see Sherlock sitting in his kitchen. Unsettling, but somehow, oddly satisfying. It was snowing even harder now, the world white beyond the windows of his cosy little house. Ann had turned down the music to a mere mummer of sound in the background, the sound of the washing machine running in the other room adding a domestic counterpoint to whatever was playing.

Greg felt oddly content as he sat down to dinner with Ann and Sherlock. It should have bothered him to have Sherlock here. Sherlock was, as Ann had reminded him, a homeless junkie. Just some kid Greg had come across and couldn't, now, seem to get rid of.

The really strange thing about it, though, was that it wasn't until he was passing the vegetables to the kid that he realised he hadn't even stopped to think about it. He'd looked at the weather, realised the shelters would be full and decided then and there to take Sherlock home with him. He hadn't even stopped to consider it. The alpha instincts that governed territorial issues hadn't been bothered in the least by the idea of Sherlock under his roof for the night. In fact, he felt deeply pleased with the fact.

Why this should be the case was somewhat baffling and Greg decided that he didn't want to analyse that feeling too closely.

There were rules at the Lestrade house as there were in any. One of them was that business of any kind was not to be discussed at the dinner table. Greg and Ann talked about things that happened at work but both of them wanted to be able to put the jobs themselves aside while they ate.

Ann's attempts to get Sherlock to talk about himself did not bear fruit. More than once Greg saw the kid open his mouth to give some kind of sharp comeback but each time Greg gave him a look that made him bite back the retort. The fact that this was working, that Sherlock was actually allowing Greg to stop him from saying whatever the hell he wanted to say was… deeply strange. Greg had had no idea that he could influence Sherlock in anyway and he couldn't claim to understand what was happening. It was possible, of course, that it was because of where they were. It was hardwired into everyone that you respected an alpha's personal territory. But the instincts that guided most people's behaviour generally seemed absent from Sherlock and Greg found it hard to believe that just being in Greg's home would alter anything much.

Again, though, this was not a gift horse he intended to look in the mouth. As conversation seemed to lag, Greg decided to play a little game.

"Sherlock," he said. The kid looked up from where he'd been picking at his food more than actually eating it. "Did you get a look at the houses on either side of us when we got here?"

Sherlock eyed him warily. "Of course," he answered.

Greg grinned, turning to Ann. "I haven't told him a thing about our neighbours, ever."

"Okay," Ann said, clearly perplexed.

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "You want me to deduce them? It's not parlour trick."

Greg just kept smiling as he leaned back in his seat. "Well?" he asked, raising an eyebrow in challenge.

Sherlock sighed as though put upon but Greg saw his eyes light with both the challenge and the chance to show off. The kid could never back down from the opportunity to do either.

Ann sipped at her wine, looking with interest now.

"This is that thing you do at crime scenes?" she asked. "Where you know everything just by looking?"

"I simply observe and deduce from those observations. It's not hard but no one ever pays _attention._" The all too common complaint lacked a certain level of its heat though as his mind was clearly already on the challenge. He sat back then and closed his eyes, pressing his hands together beneath his chin, almost as if in prayer.

"The house on the left is that of an elderly widow. She has lived there for some time. More than ten years but less than twenty. Fourteen I'd say. She's lived there since before her husband… No, from before her _mate_ died. However, it is not where their raised their children. Nor was it a retirement home. They moved into it when he became ill to be close to family. Not her family, though. Children of his, from a previous marriage before he mated with her. She's older... probably in her seventies or eighties and while she is beginning to have some physical limitations she is far from incapable of taking care of herself. Still, you have been concerned enough about her recently that you not only have a key to her house but visit there often to check up on her."

Ann's wine glass hung forgotten in her hand as she stared at Sherlock, her lips slightly parted in shock. Her blue eyes opened wide in a way Greg found not only amusing but also rather captivating.

"On the other side is middle aged bachelor. While he acknowledges his home to be part of your territory, Lestrade, he is less than pleased by the fact that he cannot hold it himself. Beta, certainly. I doubt that the fact that he must be in the territory of an alpha is what bothers him though. His family while not as wealthy as they'd like to be thought, does have some certain... connections. Therefore, it is not so much that his home is in the territory of a neighbouring alpha that bothers him so much as the fact that he views you as socially beneath him and dislikes the fact that he is, by custom, in a somewhat subordinate position to you. I would imagine that it might not have been so bad, if you weren't obviously both as dominant as you are while being fairly careless about the fact. Those of his social rank often feel that an alpha as dominant as you are should stand on more ceremony with those around them.

"He particularly dislikes the noise of the children on the other side of him and the fact that you indulge them enough to allow them to come over and play in your garden as well as their own. A rather idiotic way to be as it is to be expected that any alpha would like to have the pups in his territory near whenever it is convenient for that to be the case. And as children, they would naturally gravitate toward you and want to be near you for the protection you would provide. That's simply instinct. This is exacerbated by the fact that she is a single parent trying to raise two... no, three boys. Therefore you are not only the alpha they would naturally took to for protection but, by extension, a sort of pseudo-pack alpha for them as their own pack alpha — not their father… an uncle perhaps? — does not live close enough to provide them with the sense of security they need. I imagine that he is also not particularly interested in being their pack alpha and has only taken on the role because of the ties of family.

"Because the boys so often come to play in your garden, it has caused some problems with the gentleman next door as they often do not take the long way around and instead routinely invade what he feels is his area. Not territory as he cannot hold territory but his particular part, his sub-territory if you will. There has been a great deal of trouble over this and it remains a standing argument between the three households."

Sherlock finally opened his eyes and look at them.

Ann still sat as she had before, seemingly frozen to the spot. Greg couldn't stop grinning. He felt ridiculously proud as if he'd had something to do with what Sherlock could do. It was stupid, but there it was. He'd told Ann about Sherlock, of course, but while she didn't _dis_believe him about what Sherlock could do, he could tell that she often felt that he was probably exaggerating a bit. Being able to show her once and for all that that was not the case was fun.

Finally, Ann seemed to breathe again and put down her wine glass. She glanced at Greg questioningly. He just shook his head. There was no trick here.

She smoothed her napkin over her lap. "Right," she said. "That was…" She seemed to think for a moment before looking up, pinning Sherlock with one of her piercing looks. "I know you probably have all kinds of… what did you call them? Deductions?" Sherlock nodded. "Alright. I'm sure you have many about me. If I ever hear you utter a single one of them you will be sorry. As long as that is understood… yes…"

She looked at Greg again, clearly still off balance. Then he watched her pull herself together. "Desert anyone?"

~0~0~0~0~0~

After Greg had helped clear the table and had gone to remove Sherlock's things out of the washer and hung them up to dry, Greg found Sherlock sitting on the couch staring at the empty fireplace. He'd opened the front curtains and the world was more or less white beyond the glass. The snow having finally covered everything and made them into nothing but vaguely defined shapes. It wasn't snowing as hard as it had been before but the wind caught what there was and whipped it into little cyclones and ephemeral, ghostly shapes.

Sherlock himself looked oddly small in the dim room. Vulnerable and young, in Greg's ill-fitting clothes in a way he'd never seemed before. His hair had dried in a profusion of utterly unruly curls. Looking at him safe, clean, and warm while just beyond him the wind was whipping through the icy world of the streets that were his home, Greg felt an unexpected lump in his throat. This was just for one night. He knew that. Tomorrow night, where would Sherlock be? Out in that icy world somewhere, trying desperately to keep warm through the long night ahead?

"I'm not helpless," Sherlock said flatly. "I have lived through winter on the streets before now. I'll survive this one as well. You needn't worry, I'll still be around to do your job for you."

Greg just shook his head. There was no point in either insisting that he was perfectly capable of doing his own damn job or that his concern for Sherlock wasn't based entirely on selfish urges.

Greg pulled the curtains closed over the vista of the white world beyond and began to build up the fire.

While he piled the kindling in and a couple of twists of paper to get the fire started they sat in a surprisingly comfortable silence. It shouldn't be but it was.

"What about your things?" Greg asked, the thought only just having occurred to him. "I'm sure you own more than just the clothes hanging up in the other room. Aren't you worried that you'll get back tomorrow and they won't be there anymore?"

"No," Sherlock said, clearly unconcerned.

Greg gave him a questioning look. "Why not?"

Sherlock shrugged. "I know people, people I help out. In turn they keep an eye on what's mine for me."

"Pack?" Greg asked, wondering for the first time if Sherlock did, in fact, have someone to look out for him.

"No," was the flat reply. Sherlock didn't elaborate further and Greg decided not to press.

When the fire was finally going, Greg stretched out in his favourite armchair. Ann stopped in to say she was going to have a bath and headed upstairs, leaving Greg and Sherlock to their strangely comfortable silence.

After a while, though, Greg roused himself from his contemplation of the fire to turn to Sherlock.

"I'd meant to ask you, have you heard anything? Any rumours about who may be responsible for the deaths of those two girls? It seems likely, that they were chosen beforehand, maybe even stalked. Someone may have seen something."

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "Of _course_ they were stalked, Lestrade, don't be stupid. The murderer certainly wouldn't have just happened to stumble upon either of them where they were at the times of their death."

"And?" Greg prodded when Sherlock didn't continue.

"No," Sherlock said finally. "No one saw anything, at least not anything other than what they'd expect to see. People come and go all the time, it's not like your little neighbourhood here with a set group of people and set schedules. Strangers are commonplace. Whoever our killer is he knows how to look like he belongs. City workers are through all the time. There's been some surveyors working near where the first victim died as there is talk, again, of trying to tear down part of the old brickwork there. They'll never get city approval for it but occasionally people try to see if they can. There's been some problem with the sewers not far from the second crime scene and there were workers there, in and out for at least a week before the death. The few newcomers to the area have been watched carefully, ever since the first murder. None of them seem to be involved, however. The packs have closed ranks and the omegas aren't being allowed to wander about by themselves."

"Neither of the victim's had packs," Greg pointed out.

"Yes, but the omegas living without packs are either seeking sanctuary with one of the local packs or leaving the area all together if they can. Three have banded together as a kind of pack, watching each other's back. I think we'll be waiting a little while before the next murder. It will be harder for the murderer to get an omega alone with everyone on high alert. Even harder with this weather that is keeping many in shelters they normally wouldn't frequent. The shelters themselves are giving preference to omegas, in concern that if they are denied a place they may be killed next. For once there's little enough grumbling about it. In fact, the alphas are insisting on it."

Greg nodded. It wasn't as though he'd been expecting much. He'd done a run of all city and municipal workers in the area himself and talked to most of them who spent any amount of time down there. He'd gone and talked to Constable Fitzhugh more about the area as well as any other officer who routinely worked down there.

He allowed the silent to fall again, oddly unwilling to press the farther with the case tonight. He was unexpectedly content just at the moment and found he'd rather keep the spectre of their killer out of this room. The house was warm, safe. Ann was soaking in the tub and when he looked a little while later, Greg found that Sherlock had dozed off on the couch. They were safe for now and murder seemed far away.

It could all wait for another day he thought. In a little while, he'd wake Sherlock and usher him up to the guest room. Then he'd curl up with Ann and sleep, content in the knowledge that both were safe under his roof where he could protect them.

They had time.

Unfortunately, for once, Sherlock was wrong.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6**

It had been unexpectedly difficult to allow Sherlock to leave the day after the snow storm. Even Ann was clearly concerned about what would happen to the kid once he left.

As often happened with Ann, her concern was not displayed by coddling. Coddling just wasn't in her nature. She all but bulled Sherlock over breakfast to make sure he ate enough, complaining that he hadn't eaten enough at dinner. Then they got into a heated argument when he refused to take the winter boots she wanted him to have. But that was Ann. The more she cared, the more she bullied. Sherlock insisted that he wouldn't take charity. Ann insisted that the boots in question were going to be thrown out anyway so it wasn't charity. It wasn't true, of course. In fact, they were the warmest boots Greg owned and he'd been planning on wearing them that day. However, when she appealed to Greg for confirmation he backed her up without hesitation. He had other boots and could buy more. Clearly all Sherlock had were a pair of shoes that were definitely _not_ made for the snow. Greg was fairly certain that Sherlock knew they were lying but in the end he took the boots, the extra socks he needed to make the boots fit and an old backpack to carry his shoes and yet more pairs of socks in.

Greg saw Ann slip some of her energy bars into the bag when Sherlock wasn't looking. Greg himself took that opportunity to slip in twenty quid.

Dropping Sherlock off not far from the first murder scene was harder still.

Greg sat in his warm car watching Sherlock trudge away through the snow toward where Greg was sure he was living in some kind of lead-to or derelict building was… uncomfortable. It wasn't right. But, he reminded himself as he finally drove away once Sherlock was out of sight, there was nothing he could do. Sherlock would only take so much help. One night under Greg's roof during a winter storm was pushing it as it was, never mind the boots. Also, there was also the fact that by the time he'd dropped Sherlock off the kid had been practically bouncing in his seat, eyes wild and yearning. Until Sherlock decided it was time to get off the drugs there was nothing Greg or anyone else could do to help him.

The week was rather slow at the yard, at least in Greg's division. A few of the homeless did freeze to death during the following week's sub-zero temperatures. None of them, thank God, Sherlock. Greg checked each morning and on the mornings when he couldn't, Bradstreet did.

The week after that it warmed up and Bradstreet told Greg that Sherlock had been by to look at a burglary gone wrong she'd caught. He'd seemed alright. Or as alright as a drug addict got.

On was on Thursday morning, before dawn, that Greg got the call he'd hoped he wouldn't get for a while yet.

~0~0~0~0~0~

It had been warmer that week but in the predawn hours it was still cold enough for there to be treacherous patches of ice on the roads and sidewalks and for the breaths of the officers on the crime scene to ghost out in puffs of white. The third scene wasn't far from the first and when Greg arrived he could hear the howling from a block away.

A human voice shouldn't be able to make a sound like that, he thought, shuddering. Somewhere between a scream and a wail it cut through the darkness and Greg didn't doubt that everyone who heard it felt it go through them like a knife. The anguish in that sound hurt to hear and it hurried Greg along.

Down in an area that had once been part of the city's sewer system, several lean-tos and other temporary places to sleep had been built. Most looked as though they'd been abandoned, probably because of the cold. The city and various churches had opened more temporary shelters due to the severity of the winter. Near the end, though, well out of the wind, one shelter was illuminated by crime scene lights. Not far from it several officers held back a young man. It was from him that the wailing was coming. His eyes were glassy with shock and he didn't seem to see Greg at all when the DI stepped in front of him. He was too pale, Greg thought even as Donovan appeared beside him.

"We've called for the EMTs," she said, having to raise her voice slightly to be heard. "They're on route."

Greg nodded. "In there?" he asked, nodded toward the lean-to. It was Donovan's turn to nod. Greg took the opportunity to observe her. These murders were hard for veteran officers to handle, so it was worth it to make sure the younger officers were able to maintain. She was a little green maybe, but she'd hold. Good.

An old blanket had been strung across one side of the structure to serve as a door, tacked up with whatever could be put to the purpose. When pushed aside Greg found exactly what he knew he'd find.

He was pretty sure this one was younger than the last. She was blonde and petite but that was about all he could tell about her at the moment, beyond the fact that she was unarguably dead. Like the others, she had been sliced open from throat to groin and everything within removed. Boxes had been stacked to make a kind of table at the back of the lean-to beyond the old mattress the body lay on. The killer had carefully placed the removed organs there, her intestines hung like a garland around the top from the nails that had been used to fashion the lean-to. A quick glance was enough to tell him that, as with both Cynthia and Felicity, this girl's reproductive organs were missing.

Not only the barbarity of it but the sick pleasure the killer had obviously taken in his almost artistic placement of her organs twisted something inside Greg.

He wasn't new to investigating murder. It was his job and he was good at it, good at getting into the heads of criminals. He'd studied the report he'd requested on the case from the yard's top criminal psychologist. None of it mattered just at that moment. He still found himself unable to comprehend why someone would do this to another person.

Raised voices caught his attention and he came back out to find that the EMTs had arrived but so had Sherlock who was once again engaged in a heated argument with Donovan.

"That's enough!" Greg called, having nearly to shout over the increasingly hoarse wailing of the young man.

Now that Greg really looked at him, he saw that he was barely more than a boy. Maybe eighteen at the outside. His brown hair flopped into his eyes, as he stared unseeing toward where the victim lay.

One of the EMTs pulled his sleeve up and administered a shot. In less than a minute the wailing died down to a choked whimper that was almost more heartrending than the wailing had been.

"She was his mate," Sherlock said, at Greg's elbow. Greg turned, not having realised that Sherlock had moved over to look inside at the body. His voice, as he continued was flat, lacking any inflection. "Her name was Sophie Emmett. That's Shaun Ferris. They bonded nearly two years ago." He was silent for a moment before speaking again. This time his voice was barely above a whisper. "She was pregnant. It was their first."

Greg shut his eyes.

"Dear God," Jones said softly beside him.

The loss of a mate was bad enough but for the boy to lose both his bond mate AND their child… Greg couldn't wrap his head around the agony of it.

"Tell the EMTs," he told Jones. They needed to know what they were dealing with. There was a possibility that they'd lose the boy as well and there wasn't much time to be wasted if he was to survive this loss. Jones nodded, his face grey with shock and horror. There was evident pity there as well when he looked toward the boy... Shaun.

Greg turned his attention back to Sherlock. He was standing by the lean-to curtain pulled back, staring down at the body. At Sophie, Greg reminded himself. God, Sherlock had known this one. Actually, knew her. The first one he'd recognised but he hadn't known her, not really. He'd just know of her. This was different. He knew the full names of both of the mated pair, knew how long they'd been mated, knew she'd been pregnant. Now, he was just standing there. Not poking at things, not even analysing the evidence as far as Greg could tell. Just staring down at the body of a girl he'd known.

"Sherlock," Greg said gently, pulling his attention away from the body. "See if you can get anything from Shaun. He might talk to someone he knows more readily than to us."

Sherlock started to shake his head but Greg persisted. "Please."

"I'll be more use..."

"Getting us the information we need," Greg interrupted.

Giving Greg a frustrated glance, Sherlock dropped the curtain. He hesitated a moment more before moving towards where Shaun now sat on an old crate, still staring toward where his bond mate lay dead. His eyes now glassy with drugs as well as shock. There was an unusual hesitancy to him as he walked toward where Jones and the EMTs stood over the boy, talking quietly.

Suddenly, Shaun's eyes focused and he saw Sherlock. In a moment he was up and running toward him, the sudden movement surprising those around him so that he got passed them before they could stop him.

Sherlock froze and didn't move, not even when Shaun reached him and swung wildly, striking Sherlock hard enough that the kid stumbled back into the wall.

"You said you catch him!" Shaun screamed, his voice high and wavering. So slurred with tears and drugs that his words were somewhat mangled but still horribly understandable. "You said you'd catch the guy and stop him!"

Greg grabbed Shaun, pulling him away from Sherlock who remained slumped against wall where he'd landed. "You said you'd stop him! You said all we had to do was be careful for a while and you'd put a stop to all this! Why didn't you?! Why didn't you stop him?! Sophie's dead! He killed my Sophie! Where the hell where you?! He killed Sophie! He killed my mate! Why didn't you stop him?!"

The EMTs were there again helping and Jones and Greg held the kid down as another shot was administered. His voice slurred even more, still trying to yell at Sherlock until he his eyes fluttered and his tensed muscles went limp as he lost consciousness. One of the EMTs had gone to fetch the stretcher. Greg and Jones helped lift Shaun's unconscious form onto it when it arrived.

When Greg turned back he found that Sherlock still hadn't moved. He was leaning against the wall, his head bowed.

"Let me see," Greg said, stepping forward and reaching out instinctively to see how badly the kid was hurt.

Sherlock jerked back away from him, head snapping up. "Don't touch me," he almost hissed and Greg took a step back, his hands lifted in a sign of surrender.

He could see the mark where Shaun's fist had connected. The bruises was forming already and Greg wished he could get a closer look. A blow like that could crack and even break bone. Sherlock, however, looked ready to attack if Greg moved any closer.

"Look, you need to get some ice on that…" Greg began.

He may not have spoken at all for all the attention Sherlock paid. He moved around Greg to reach the front of the lean-to again, carefully staying out of arm's reach as if afraid Greg too was likely to strike out at him.

He pulled back the curtain and began shooting out his rapid fire deductions about the crime in a slightly breathless voice.

"Sherlock," Greg tried to say, tried to interrupt, but Sherlock wasn't listening. So, Greg pulled out his notebook and jotted down everything Sherlock told him about Shaun and Sophie, about the killer, about what the scene could tell him.

Greg knew there was little he could do to make this any less of a nightmare for the kid. If focusing on solving this was what Sherlock needed to get him through this, Greg wasn't about to argue.

When Sherlock finally wound down Greg tried to find words, something to say that might bring the boy some kind of comfort. He couldn't find any.

"This doesn't make any sense," Sherlock growled finally, stepping back and finally allowing the curtain to fall. "Sophie had a pack, had an alpha who was also her bond mate. She wasn't a prostitute. Picked a few pockets, ran the occasional grift, but she never turned tricks. Ever. She doesn't fit the pattern."

"What kind of pack?" Greg asked.

Most packs, Greg's among them, were what were colloquially known as "paper packs". All that held these packs together was mutual agreement and the filing of paperwork to record that agreement. For the most part people came and went, belonging to various packs throughout their lives. Usually, giving their allegiance to whoever was in a possession of authority over them or to the family they belonged to.

These kids, however, were homeless. Their packs would be based on nothing more than an agreement between the parties involved. It was highly unlikely there would be anything as formal as a any kind of legally binding or written agreement. So, it's possible the killer didn't realise that she did indeed have pack beyond her mate.

That is, if they were like most packs. There was, however, another kind pack.

Intrinsic packs were different. Sometimes you met someone who belonged to you in a way beyond simple agreement or choice. Something in the brain chemistry changed in both the alpha and the pack member, they somehow seemed to recognise each other on a biochemical level. There had been any number of studies done on the phenomenon of inartistic pack relations and the nature of the bond involved. No one really understood it, though. Brain scans of alphas showed distinct differences when they smelled a paper pack mate and an intrinsic one. Brain scans of the pack members showed corresponding alterations when exposed to the scent of an alpha that was theirs by choice or theirs inartistically. If an alpha had more than one intrinsic pack member those pack members would, over time, even react to one another differently on a biochemical level.

While intrinsic packs were considered something special, something more than other packs, Greg himself honestly hoped he would never met anyone who was intrinsically his. The idea of anyone belonging to him in that kind of a way was... well, uncomfortable didn't cover it. For once thing, they would be his for the rest of both of their lives. There would be no way to get rid of them. The responsibility would be permanent. He couldn't help but feel that the weight of such a responsibility would be crushing.

Luckily, most alphas never had intrinsic pack members. It wasn't common in this day and age and therefore it was not really something Greg needed to worry about when it came to his own life.

Still, it was something he had to keep in mind for his job. If Shaun and Sophie's pack had been based on more than an understanding between members and their alpha it would matter.

Sherlock still frowned toward where the body was now mercifully hidden. "Two were intrinsic. The other three were all one knee arrangements." It was traditional to go down on your knees to your alpha when joining a pack. A one knee arrangement was often used to describe an agreement that was little more than a temporary matter of convenience between both alpha and pack member. "Sophie was one of the intrinsic members of Shaun's pack, as well as being his bonded mate."

"Damn," Greg muttered. She didn't fit the established pattern of victim in any way.

"She _was_ homeless," Jones offered, having returned in time to hear Sherlock's information on the pack. Clearly, though, even he knew that it was flimsy. Sherlock was right, this made no sense. The other two had been completely alone, no one to stand as protector. Sophie didn't just have her alpha and bond mate, she'd had a full pack including one who was intrinsic.

Sherlock was shaking his head. "It doesn't fit," he said again, more to himself than to Greg. "Sophie should have been safe. I don't understand. What did I miss?"

Again, Greg found himself searching for words of comfort. Again, he came up with nothing. The official line of 'I'm sorry for your loss' wouldn't help.

Donovan called him over then to talk to the Medical Examiner's people who had just arrived.

When Greg turned back a couple of minutes later, Sherlock was gone.

~0~0~0~0~0~

Sophie Emmett had been seventeen years old. 5'3", blonde and blue, a hundred and thirty-four pounds. The daughter of a prostitute and drug addict and an unknown father, she'd been on and off the streets since she was a child. Two years before she'd met Shaun Ferris. They'd bonded within three months and taken off together. She'd been four months pregnant at the time of her death.

There was little enough that could be got form Shaun during the first two days after Sophie's death. He had to be kept heavily sedated while his body adjusted to the fact that he was no longer bonded. The loss of a bond mate was hard enough for anyone but when that bond was broken by violence it was not uncommon of the surviving half of the bond to follow.

On the third day, Greg finally was able to interview the boy but there was little enough to find out. The pack had felt that the area was becoming too dangerous. The other four members had been sent out in teams of two to scout out possible new locations in other parts of the city. They had left the day before.

The night of her death Sophie had been sick. The pregnancy had been easy enough until a week ago when she begun having morning sickness more or less constantly and there were few enough things that seem to help calm her stomach. She'd asked Shaun to go and get her a bottle of coke and some Gaviscon as she had been out of both. He hadn't wanted to leave her alone but she'd been feeling weak after a particularly prolonged bout of vomiting and had just wanted to lie still. After some argument, Shaun had agreed to go and get what she'd asked for. There had been some trouble at the store as a new clerk was there and had given Shaun some trouble, having apparently decided the kid looked like he was up to no good. Eventually Shaun had had to pull out the money he had and actually show it to the guy before the clerk would even allow him to pick out what he'd gone there to get.

He'd been gone for little more than a hour when he returned to find Sophie dead.

"Quick work," Donovan murmured as they walked away from Shaun's hospital room. She'd accompanied him to question Shaun as he's sent Jones to try and find the other pack members.

"He must have been waiting," Greg said. "Sherlock said that he was likely stalking them prior to killing them and I'd say this confirms it. Not that I'd had much doubt on that head. The killer had to have been watching them, waiting for an opportunity. The minute Shaun left, he would have had to be there to start on her right away."

"It's a hell of a risk," Donovan said. Greg hadn't missed the way her lips had pursed in annoyance when he'd mentioned Sherlock. "I mean, how did he know how long the kid would be gone? If he'd come back while the killer was there it would have got nasty." Alphas had been known to tear those who attacked their mates apart with their bare hands.

Greg shrugged. "Maybe over heard them ahead of time. Shaun said that they'd argued about whether he would go or not. They might have raised their voices."

"Or maybe it wasn't our guy at all," Donovan suggested as they got in the elevator.

"Meaning?" Greg said, pushing the button for the ground floor.

"The press was all over the last murder, everyone knows what was done to the other two. And Sophie Emmett doesn't fit the victim profile. What if Shaun killed her? They both know that junkie of yours and he knows all the particulars. He could have told them anything that wasn't in the papers."

Greg considered. "Yes, but that would imply that Shaun has the same kind of medical knowledge our killer has. And that knowledge is pretty extensive. Unlikely for a boy who never even finished his GCSEs."

Donovan looked like he'd burst her bubble and Greg had to resist the urge to pat her shoulder.

"It was a good idea, though, and one that we'll have to follow up on just in case. We don't want the damn lawyers trying to pin Sophie's murder on Shaun when we finally get the killer into court."

Donovan just nodded.

"Her mate said that the vic could fight," Donovan mused as they left the hospital. "Why didn't she?"

Greg shrugged, pulling open the car door and getting in.

"She was sick," he said as Donovan climbed in beside him.

"Yeah," she answered, bulking herself in as he turned on the car and pulled gratefully away from the hospital and Shaun's devastated grief. "Still, if a guy comes at me with a knife, or a scalpel or whatever, I don't care how sick I am, I'm going to try to fight."

Greg tapped at the steering wheel as he thought. "You're right, of course, but we don't know that she didn't fight. Should could have struck him several times without there being anything for us to find afterwards."

"And no one heard anything," Donovan said, sounding both frustrated and annoyed.

"They never do in that part of town."


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7

A week after Sophie Emmett's death, Shaun Ferris took his own life. While he wasn't technically a victim of their killer, Greg placed his picture on the board next to Sophie's anyway. Their serial killer may not have tied the rope Shaun had hung himself with, but he'd killed him just as surely as if he had.

The week after that, when Sherlock still hadn't shown up at any of either Greg or Bradstreet's crime scenes, Greg began to become a little concerned. It wasn't that it was unheard of for Sherlock to fail to turn up for a couple of weeks. Still, with the deaths of both Sophie and Shaun, Greg would have liked to know for sure that he was alright.

After the third week he and Bradstreet began taking turns checking the hospitals and the morgues, but Greg kept telling himself that he really wasn't _*that*_ worried. Sherlock wasn't actually a child, no matter how infantile his petulance could sometimes be, and he'd been on his own for a while now.

It wasn't until no one at the yard had seen him a month that Greg was finally able to admit to himself that he was, indeed, worried.

It was frustrating. The kid was nothing to him, he reminded himself. He wasn't pack, he wasn't even a friend. But telling himself that Sherlock was just some junkie only made him feel like a fool because he knew better. Ann insisted that he was over reacting and maybe he was. The problem was that no one else worried. Even Bradstreet was only mildly concerned.

If there was family or pack out there looking for the boy they certainly weren't looking very hard as Greg had more than once scanned the missing person's files just in case. Sometimes it felt as if he and he alone cared whether Sherlock lived or died. Which was stupid. Bradstreet cared. Ann cared. It was, however, Greg alone who felt the growing certainty that something was wrong.

It was a relief every day that the John Does continued not to include Sherlock. Still, it didn't mean he hadn't overdosed somewhere, wasn't lying dead in some gutter.

Trying to find one homeless kid in a city the size of London wasn't easy. But still, Greg tried.

In the beginning Ann gave him some grief for devoting some of his precious few off hours to locating someone who was not his responsibility. After a month though, Greg could raise the number of people concerned about Sherlock's whereabouts to three.

When Sherlock had been gone for five weeks Bradstreet came over one evening to compare notes on where the kid could have got to. Ann had little to offer, but she sat with them and kept them well supplied with tea.

The need to find Sherlock, to know that he was at the very least still alive kept eating at him. Yes, Ann and Bradstreet were concerned, he wasn't alone in that. But both had other worries and other things to think about. For Greg it was harder and harder to concentrate on anything else. No matter how many times he tried to tell himself that Sherlock was more than capable of looking after himself, he didn't believe it.

"He's been on the streets for a while," Ann said one night, threading her fingers through Greg's hair while his head lay on her shoulder. "Long before he had you to worry about him. He's a genius, you said so yourself. He'll be fine."

But Ann hadn't seen his face after Shaun Ferris had hit him, hadn't heard the flat, empty quality of his voice as he'd deduced the last moments of Sophie Emmett's life.

Greg began putting out feelers among the few homeless he knew and the snitches he'd cultivated since joining the force. Bradstreet did as well and managed to convince a couple of other officers to do the same. Nothing. It was as though Sherlock had dropped off the face of the planet.

It was late in the evening after nearly six weeks with no Sherlock when his work mobile rang. Ann made a face as he slipped out of the living room but said nothing, just paused the movie they'd been watching. She'd been a cop's wife long enough by now.

The number was withheld which was odd but it wouldn't be the first time one of his informants had called that way.

"Lestrade."

"I believe you have been looking for someone," said a cultured voice on the other end.

"I'm a police officer, I look for a lot of people," Greg responded. Whoever this was it wasn't one of his informants. "How did you get this number?"

"It wasn't really that hard Detective Inspector. And please don't play dumb. We both know exactly whom I am speaking of." The man's voice spoke of education and privilege. And money.

"Am I speaking to Mr. Holmes?" Greg asked.

"Very clever Inspector," the man — Holmes — answered. "I know where you can find Sherlock and I would be grateful to you if you would see about collecting him."

"Why not do it yourself since you're so interested in him?"

"There are reasons why it would be better for it to be you, Detective Inspector," Holmes answered placidly. "Also I'd suggest you hurry, Sherlock has been, shall we say, not quite himself these last few weeks. Even I have been unaware of his whereabouts for most of it. Please try to be quick."

As soon as he got off the phone he called Bradstreet. The address he'd been given was not in the best part of town and he'd rather not do this without back up.

When he turned to leave he found Ann there. She said nothing, just held out his jacket.

"Thanks," he said, meaning the understanding more than the jacket.

Ann nodded. "It's supposed to be a wet spring," she said, handing him an old rain coat after he'd grabbed his keys. "The boy will need this."

Greg kissed her and took the coat.

~0~0~0~0~0~

The directions Holmes gave Greg took him and Bradstreet to an area near Paddington where a network of train tunnels provided shelter from the wind for many of London's homeless. It was late and many had already bedded down for the night in darkened corners while other's clustered around trashcans where anaemic fires had been lit in hopes of warding off the cold. They all eyed the two police officers warily as they carefully made their way farther into the darkness.

"You were right, by the way," Bradstreet said as they walked.

"Was I?" Greg asked, not really paying attention.

"Yes. Two weeks ago I found out that all my records, evaluations, and case reports had been accessed. Chamberlain is pitching a fit."

She sounded perfectly calm about it, apparently unconcerned by this invasion of her privacy. Greg couldn't help but smile slightly.

Many parts of these old tunnels had not been covered over the days before London sprawled over them and made them part of the underground network. Some areas therefore included architectural flourishes like small areas of fake colonnades which created recesses into the brickwork. Many of these little alcoves had tarps or blankets stretched across them to give those who claimed them some semblance of privacy. It was one of these that they'd been directed to. Someone, Sherlock presumably, had strung not one but two blankets over the entrance, completely covering the area behind it.

"Sherlock?" Bradstreet called. There was no answer. No light shown from beneath the blankets.

Greg was reminded, uncomfortably of the place Sophie had died and found that it was with more than a little trepidation that he pulled the blankets aside.

A lump of yet more blankets lay huddled on an old and stained mattress.

"Sherlock?" Greg said, reaching out. Pulling the blankets away he found Sherlock lying there, still and pale. For one horrible moment Greg was sure he was dead.

Bradstreet dropped down on the mattress beside Sherlock, heedless of the stains on it.

She pressed her fingers to Sherlock's throat even as she was pulling her mobile out of her pocket. "There's a heartbeat," she said, sounding suddenly breathless. "Barely."

Greg knelt down beside her and as Bradstreet called for an ambulance he checked Sherlock's vitals himself, noting with a sort of detached feeling that his hands were shaking slightly.

Sherlock's heart was beating. However, barely had been the operative word in Bradstreet's statement. His pulse was far too slow, far too weak.

Greg kept his fingers pressed to Sherlock's neck while they waited. Within fifteen minutes of their arrival, it stopped all together.

Bradstreet began compressions immediately. When she was done Greg pinched Sherlock's nose, tilted his head back and forced his own breath into the boy's lungs. He was not going to allow him to die, not like this. It was *_not*_ going to happen.

For another fifteen minutes they worked, Bradstreet counting aloud as she continued compressions then waiting while Greg breathed for him. They said nothing to one another, just worked with grim efficiency.

They were still working on him when the EMTs finally arrived. They took over compressions and replaced Greg with a bag. Greg wanted to object, had some strange wild feeling that it was only his breath that could bring Sherlock back, not something pressed into him from a bag. He swallowed it back, knowing it to be stupid.

As they were sliding him into the ambulance Greg went to get in as well.

One of the EMTs reached out to stop him. "Sir, you can't…"

Bradstreet interrupted him before Greg could think of a reason he should be allowed to accompany them.

"He's his pack alpha," she said sharply.

The EMT backed off quickly. "Of course, I'm sorry."

"Thanks," Greg said, climbing into the ambulance.

"I'll see you in hospital," was all she said.

As soon as they were moving the EMT in the back with Greg pulled out a defibrillator.

"Come one, come on," Greg muttered watching Sherlock intently.

One jolt. Two. Three.

The heart monitor came to life.

"We have a beat," the EMT said. Greg pulled in a ragged breath at the same time Sherlock did.

The drive through London seemed to take forever though Greg knew it wasn't long at all. Once they reached the hospital Sherlock was whisked off where Greg couldn't follow. He sat on a plastic chair in the hall, his elbows resting on his knees as he stared at the tile floor in front of him. He felt utterly drained.

He didn't move as someone sat down next to him some time later.

"I called your sergeant," Bradstreet told him. "He's collecting your car now and will bring it here."

_*I should have thought of that,*_ Greg thought. He just nodded.

"Thanks," he said finally. "And for thinking to say that I was his pack alpha. I hadn't thought of that."

Bradstreet snorted. "You nearly are," she said. "You're the closet thing he's go at any rate. Maybe if he lives through this you should try to get him to acknowledge you."

Greg snorted out a laugh. "Yeah, that will be the day. Me as Sherlock's alpha."

Bradstreet shrugged. "Why not. Someone will have to be sooner or later."

Greg sat up and looked at her in confusion, realising for the first time that she wasn't joking. "Why? Lot of people live without alphas."

"You mean you haven't figured it out?" she demanded, obviously surprised.

Greg just looked at her.

She suddenly laughed. "Oh my God, you haven't have you? I thought for sure…"

Greg had to swallow back a growl. He was tired and worried and when that happened it was all too easy for the instincts of an alpha to overwhelm his normal self-control. Being made to feel a fool by a beta, even one he liked who was of equal rank to him in the force, did not sit well at the moment.

"What?" he demanded finally when she didn't answer.

"Sherlock's an omega," Bradstreet said.

Greg just stared at her.

She sobered and looked him dead in the eye. "Someone is going to have to step in," she told him. "He needs pack, needs an alpha willing to put up with him and willing to do what it takes to get him cleaned up before he kills himself. I for one do not want to go through another night like this one. And frankly, if you don't step in I don't think anyone else will."


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8

The monitor beeped softly, somehow managing to define rather than interrupt the silence. Sherlock had been moved into a private room some twenty minutes before. Greg still didn't know why and as he was supposed to be here as Sherlock's alpha he was kind of afraid. He'd just been informed that that was where Sherlock was and so he'd headed there, still somewhat in a daze.

Generally speaking there were four possible gender/permutation combinations. Men were either alphas or betas and Women were either betas or omegas. The main physical differences between alpha males and beta males were the size of their balls — as alphas produced nearly twice as much sperm as betas — and the presence or absence of a knot in the presence of the triggering hormones from an omega in oestrus. Generally alpha males were better endowed, but that was a matter of averages rather than anything else. With women it was different as those things which distinguished betas and omegas form one another were not apparent on the outside and were almost entirely to be found in the nature of their oestrus cycles. Betas went through a rather quiet monthly cycle which included a five to seven day menstrual period, while omegas went through a far more dramatic three to five month cycle — depending on the omega — that included two to three days of intense sexual need, called heat, followed by another two to three days of a far lighter menstrual cycle than betas experienced. The end result was that alpha/omega pairs were about forty percent more likely to successfully reproduce than any other combination. With beta/beta pairs being the least fertile and often finding it extremely difficult to have children without medical assistance. Alphas and omegas were, therefore, often referred to as the breeding genders. There were some temperamental differences between the four gender/permutation types. They were, however, more a matter of generalities rather than universal truths.

However, the complicated nature of the genetics that coded for alpha/beta/omega traits meant that things sometimes got crossed, leading to the fifth and sixth sex/permutation combinations.

While not as rare as being born with sexual ambiguities, those born with the wrong permutation for their sex wasn't common. It did, however, happen from time to time.

An omega. Sherlock was an omega. The idea kept running around in his head and he felt like an idiot.

"Why else would he be so careful about hiding his permutation?" Bradstreet had asked, still clearly finding Greg's surprise at the information amusing.

Greg hadn't wanted to admit his theory that there had simply been something wrong with Sherlock's scent. It seemed kind of ridiculous now. But really, as these things went that was statistically the more likely scenario. Some detective he was. He'd known the kid for months and the possibility of his having a crossed permutation had never even occurred to him.

He'd had an aunt who'd been a female alpha, so it wasn't like it wasn't something he'd ever come across before. And as a police officer he knew as well as anyone that the stereotypes regarding the natural behaviour for each of the permutations was rubbish. Many betas were more than helpers and aids, look at Bradstreet for one and Jones for another. Many alphas weren't terribly aggressive or natural leaders. And, of course, not all omegas were submissive and home/family oriented. Greg was well aware of all of that.

Still, Sherlock was so… He was so assertive and caustic. Standing completely on his own and refusing any and all aid. Homeless and, for the most part, able to take care of himself.

For all that he knew better, Greg had mentally categorised him as an alpha based solely on his behaviour. And that being the case, his careful hiding of his natural scent suggested that there was something wrong with it, something either off-putting or confusing about it. He'd never even considered the possibility that Sherlock was one of those born with the wrong permutation, he just hadn't.

Jones had arrived a bit more than an hour ago to give Greg the keys to his car and tell him where in the parking lot it was. He'd stayed long enough to be sure that Sherlock would live before heading back out. He had to work in the morning but said that he would tell Chamberlain that Greg had had a family emergency and wouldn't be in. Bradstreet herself had left not long after. She had a hot case at the moment and couldn't afford not to be in to work in the morning.

That left Greg to be taken up to Sherlock's private room alone.

He'd stopped dead for a moment when he'd seen the white board outside of the room giving the details of the occupant.

Patient: Holmes (m/o)

Allergies: Codeine

Duty Nurse: Rachel

It had taken a moment for him to force his legs to work again and propel him into the room. Holmes? Sherlock's name…?

The nurse had been busy checking Sherlock's vitals and hadn't noticed Greg's shock. On her way out she said that there should be a doctor in to talk to him shortly.

As soon as she was gone Greg stepped back out of the room to snatch the chart the woman had put into its plastic holder by the door on her way to check on another patient.

The name listed was 'William Sherlock Holmes'. The fact that it did indeed confirm that Sherlock was an omega was almost inconsequential as a result. Sherlock had said that it was because of his mind that this government type by the name of 'Holmes' was so interested in him. And in all honesty, with a mind like Sherlock's that was just about believable. Greg had known at the time, of course, that there were things Sherlock wasn't telling him. Still, though, _*this*_ he hadn't expected. And why the hell would he go by the name Sherlock when he had a perfectly normal first name to use? Although, Greg reflected, William didn't really seem to fit the kid. And the idea of someone calling him Will or, God forbid, Billy was laughable.

And come to that, how the hell had the hospital got Sherlock's full name? Who had given it to them? Holmes, it had to be. The other Holmes, he'd mentally corrected himself with a glance at the bed. He'd told Greg where Sherlock was and that he was in trouble. It stood to reason he'd have been ready when Sherlock got to hospital.

Now that he realised that this was a matter of family, everything that had happened over the last few months made a great deal more sense. The lengths Holmes had been going through to get Sherlock out of trouble and keep tabs on him… Yes, family seemed far more likely than any kind of job prospect.

Replacing the chart Greg slumped in the chair by the bed. Lying still in the narrow hospital bed, stiff white sheets pulled up to his chin and curls flattened against an institutionally perfect pillow, Sherlock looked younger than ever. According to the chart he was twenty-five. So young. Too damn young to be living the life he was. Sleeping under bridges, destroying his mind with drugs… never mind the fact that a month ago he stood over the eviscerated body of a friend.

The doctor walked in only moments later. An older alpha, he had the feeling of the old family practitioner about him.

"You would be Mr. Holmes' alpha?" he asked.

Still feeling dazed and now feeling a bit of a fraud, Greg stood and nodded, accepting the hand held out to him. There was no way that he was going to admit at this point that Sherlock was without a pack and be kicked out of here for the trouble. Besides, Bradstreet was right, someone was going to have to stand for him.

"Greg Lestrade," he said.

"Dr. Carmichael," the doctor said shaking his hand. "This has been a bad business."

Greg grimaced, pushing all other thoughts to the back of his mind and focusing on the immediate problem. "Yeah, I know. I found him."

"Are you the one who performed CPR?" the doctor asked.

Greg nodded.

"It's a good thing you did. He wouldn't have survived otherwise."

Greg tried not to think about Sherlock dead and cold back in that hovel.

"He'll be alright now though." It was more a statement than a question, the kind that demanded an affirmative answer.

"That's going to depend," Dr. Carmichael said. "This was a close call and maybe that will scare some sense into him. But from the look of the boy he's been using for a while." The doctor looked to Greg for confirmation which Greg gave with an unhappy nod. "Then that's unlikely. He'll survive this, but at the rate he's going I'd say it's only a matter of time before worse happens."

Greg looked away, feeling a ridiculous sense of shame. He wasn't Sherlock's alpha and it made no sense for him to feel as though he should have done something to stop this.

The doctor put his hand on Greg's arm and Greg looked back to see compassion on the doctor's face. "As a pack alpha myself as well as a doctor, I do understand," he said. "You feel like you should have been able to stop this from happening. Unfortunately, drug addicts do as they please, even when it breaks the hearts of those around them."

Greg swallowed back the emotions, surprised by the strength of them and touched by the doctor's words.

"I know," he said, nodding. "I'm a police officer so I've seen it all before."

The doctor nodded dropping his hand. "Still, it's different when it's personal," he said.

Greg could only nod.

For the next fifteen minutes the doctor went over exactly what they had done and what Greg could expect over the next several days as Sherlock recovered and began to detox. Greg was caught between a strong desire to get the hell out of here and the equally strong certainty that a herd of wild elephants couldn't pull him away.

He didn't want this, didn't want responsibility over the lives of others. The only two people who looked to him as their alpha did so only due to either proximity or convenience. They didn't need him to take care of them and they certainly didn't need him to make decisions on their behalf.

Here and now though he had to be the one to do this. Well, no he actually didn't. He wasn't Sherlock's alpha, he _*wasn't*_. But someone had to. The kid didn't have an alpha, didn't have a pack. Apparently he had some family but there was clearly something wrong there and Greg had no idea where they were or who they were. But they weren't here. That smacked of people who didn't care. Someone had called Greg, someone had given the kid's name to the hospital and arranged for this room. That spoke of something. But they weren't _*here*_. They clearly knew where he was and they weren't making any attempt to do more than this. They were leaving his care in the hands of others. Who was here was Greg. Bradstreet had told them that he was the kid's alpha and he hadn't said different. And so, here he was. He could walk away. He could tell them the truth and leave.

No, no he couldn't. He wouldn't be the man he wanted to be if he did.

And no matter how much he didn't want to be the one to watch over Sherlock, the one to deal with the doctors and face the realities of caring for a drug addict who had overdosed… He couldn't leave. All he had to do was think about walking out that door, abandoning the still silent form in the bed, and his stomach clenched in fear.

"One last thing," the doctor said finally. "After an overdose like this, the detox will have to be complete. That means that we can't give him any hormone suppressants. I don't know how long it has been since his last heat…" he trailed off looking to Greg.

Greg had no idea but knowing Sherlock… "A while," he said, feeling fairly confident that this would be the case.

The doctor nodded as though he'd suspected this.

"I would start making arrangements for him at an omega retreat as soon as possible then. There is one just outside of London, the Mech Clinic, which specifically works with omegas going through detox. I'll have a nurse bring you the information. I would expect him to go into heat sometime in the next couple of weeks. Although, to be honest it could start sooner. We'll be keeping a close eye on him."

Greg rubbed his hand over his eyes, beyond exhausted. "Will the NHS cover that particular retreat?" he asked. He didn't know who had arranged for this room or how to contact them. He could hope that they would step in and help again but he couldn't count on it.

The doctor frowned. "Yes, but there is a waiting list. It is primarily a private institution, they only take so many NHS cases. There's little chance of getting him in in time."

"Where else would you suggest then?"

"There are a few others with people on staff that could handle this situation," the doctor said, clearly unhappy that he couldn't have his patient in specialist hands. Greg liked him for that. He cared about Sherlock's care, instead of just writing him off as another junkie not worth his time as so many doctors would. "I'll have the nurse bring you information on all of them, including the private clinic just in case."

Greg nodded and held out his hand.

"Thank you," he said. "It matters that you're taking your time like this and not just writing him off. He… I know you probably see a lot of junkies and all of their pack mates probably tell you that they are special but… He really is."

The doctor shook his hand with a small, sad smile. "They all are. I just wish they could see that."

Greg felt his throat close slightly and all he could do was nod.

Once he was alone Greg sagged back into the chair beside the bed. He'd called Ann when they'd first arrived at hospital and she was expecting him to stay the night here. He'd said he'd be home later but she'd disagreed.

"You'll stay as long as you have to, even if that's all night. Don't worry about it. Take care of him and I'll see you in the morning."

It would be a long night, Greg thought staring at the too pale face of a homeless kid who shouldn't have mattered a thing to him. But Ann was right as was Bradstreet. Someone had to stand for him now as pack, as alpha. Even if anyone else had been willing to step in, Greg wasn't sure he'd be willing to give up the charge. A fact that scared him more than a little.

He'd just sit and wait for the nurse with all the information he needed. Then he'd go home and go to bed. He certainly wasn't going to sit here all night at the bedside of someone who wasn't even a pack mate.


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9

"Greg?" The voice was accompanied by a hand on his shoulder and Greg started awake.

He groaned trying to sit up and finding that his neck had apparently acquired extra joints since last he noticed. Sun shone in around the edges of the thin drapes pulled over the window. Sun? Thin drapes? What…?

He blinked again and remembered. Sherlock. Overdose. Hospital.

He groaned again. He hadn't intended to spend the night here. He really hadn't.

After talking to Dr Carmichael Greg had waited for the nurse and after she'd arrived with the promised information on omega retreats capable of dealing with an omega in withdrawal, he remembered starting to go through the information. But that was all. He'd meant to go home but worrying over the huge 'what now?' hanging over his head he'd just sat here in this stupid chair going over the information and trying to get a handle on what he was going to do. At some point he must have fallen asleep.

Now it was morning and Ann was standing beside him looking both worried and amused.

"I didn't mean to stay here all bloody night," he muttered straightening up and wincing. It seemed it wasn't only his neck that decided to grow some extra joints over the course of the night. He glanced toward the bed but Sherlock appeared to still be asleep. Greg didn't know if he'd ever regained consciousness last night or whether he should be worried about that or not.

Ann placed a bag she'd been carrying on the floor next to him. "I knew you would," she said. She handed him a steaming paper cup and another bag, this one smaller, warm, fragrant and baring the mark of one of Greg's favourite coffee shops. "There's a change of clothes in the other bag."

"I love you," Greg said, with full heartfelt devotion.

She just smiled and pressed a kiss to his lips. "How is he?"

Greg took a fortifying sip of coffee.

He looked toward Sherlock again, not wanting to wake him. He nodded toward the door, getting up with another stifled groan.

Ann followed him out into the hall and Greg shut the door quietly behind them. He drank more coffee and attempted to convince the ligaments in his back that they actually were supposed to be flexible. He stretched and something in his back gave a startlingly loud crack. It hurt like hell but as that faded it seemed to take a good deal of pain with it. He sighed gratefully.

"What time is it?" he asked.

"Almost ten," Ann answered looking him over with amused sympathy. "You look like you've been through the wars, love." She sobered then. "Was it really bad?"

Greg leaned back against the wall and shut his eyes. "God, Ann. He's been living in a bloody railway tunnel. When Badstreet and I got there he was barely breathing. We called for an ambulance but before it got there he stopped all together. We had to do CPR on him for… I don't know. It seemed like forever, but it was probably only about ten minutes or so. They had to defib him in the ambulance."

Ann had taken his hand as he talked and she squeezed it now.

"Will he be alright?"

Greg shrugged. "Depends on what you mean. He'll survive this. But how long until it happens again?" He looked at his wife, wondering what he was going to do about the situation. "The problem is bigger than just that though."

Ann sighed. "Of course it is. Okay, what's going on?"

"Sherlock's an omega."

Ann's eyes widened. "Greg!" she gasped. "You let him stay out there when there was a killer hunting omegas…"

Greg held up his hands. "I didn't know! Until last night I had no idea!"

She calmed. "None?" she asked, as though suspecting him of making this up to keep himself out of trouble.

"You smelled him the night he stayed with us," Greg said.

"Yes, but that was one night," Ann objected. "You mean he was that ambiguous all the time?"

Greg nodded.

"And you never asked him why he did that?"

"Of course I asked," Greg said. "He ignored the question. Which, if you think about it isn't all that surprising."

"Alright," Ann sighed. "So his alpha…"

Greg shook his head. "He doesn't have one."

Ann blinked. "No pack at all?"

"None," Greg affirmed.

"Dear God."

"So, I have a problem. Bradstreet told the EMTs that I was his alpha so that I could ride in the ambulance with him. When I got here… Someone had to be here to stand as pack so I did. Now it's morning, the doctors all think that I'm his pack alpha and as there's no one else…"

"Sooner or later they're going to realise that he has no pack," Ann said. "What then?"

Greg shook his head. "That's only if they access his information and why should they? I'm here saying I'm his alpha and unless that's challenged they aren't likely to waste their time going after his other information."

Ann sighed. "But you're _*not*_ his alpha. Love, I know you care about him and feel responsible for him, but you can't actually intend to step in as his pack alpha. For one thing I doubt he'll be all that pleased about this when he wakes up."

Greg shrugged holding out his hand in defeat. "What am I supposed to do? Just abandon him. Now? The doctors said that because of what they are giving him to help him over the withdrawal, they can't give him any suppressants. He's going to go into heat. Soon. Two weeks at the latest and someone has to find somewhere for him to go. Most omega retreats can't deal with someone in withdrawal and there's so little time to find anywhere to take him. The time it would take to find someone who can stand in as his alpha and _*then*_ find somewhere for him to stay. The time just isn't there."

Ann closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose. "Yes, I do see. Well, I suppose I'm not all that surprised."

"Sorry?" Greg asked, uncertain what she meant.

"Greg, love. You brought the kid home to stay the night at our house. You brought him into your personal territory and spent a good deal of the evening watching over him as he slept on the couch."

"That was just…"

Ann cut him off. "You've been looking out for him for some time. Now it turns out that he's not just on his own but an omega on his own. No, you're not the kind of man to turn your back on a friend in need, but this is more than that. You feel a responsibility for him.

Greg shrugged. "I never intended to take him on as pack. You know how I feel about pack."

It was Ann's turn to shrug. "Yes, but you are still an alpha and an extremely dominant one as well. The fact of the matter is that it's in your nature to have a pack to protect and care for. I don't need much in the way of care and neither does that Constable of yours. You care about us but we're not going to satisfy the alpha side of your nature forever."

"There's a difference between having a pack and having," Greg waived his hand toward the room, "this kind of problem to deal with."

"But you *_are*_ dealing with it," Ann said. "And by your own choice. Be honest, if someone else came in here right now, someone you didn't know, and told you that he was Sherlock's alpha and you could bugger off now, would you do it?"

After a moment Greg unhappily shook his head. "Not without checking him out thoroughly beforehand."

"Not even then, I'd bet," Ann said. "He's yours Greg. I think part of you has recognised that for some time now. Until you see him safely with an alpha you can trust to be a good pack leader for him you're not going to let him go."

Greg swore. But Ann was right. She usually was. Until he knew for sure that Sherlock was safe with a pack leader Greg knew would look after him, give him the attention and protection he needed, Greg wasn't going to give up his protection of the kid.

~0~0~0~0~0~

One thing was glaringly obvious now, Greg thought as he returned to the room after changing his clothes and getting a second cup of coffee from the cafe downstairs. For some reason, it hadn't occurred to him until Ann had pointed it out. If Sherlock was an omega then he was a potential target for the killer. And Greg was willing to bet that the kid hadn't taken the least precautions.

"You bloody idiot," he muttered, toward the bed. He was angry, frustrated and unaccountably hurt that Sherlock hadn't trusted him. He knew that last one was stupid. He'd known Sherlock only trusted him so far but… Well, he felt it just the same. "You're as at risk as any other omega. But I'll just bet you haven't even tried to take any extra precautions, have you?"

"I'm not female."

The reply was barely more than a mumble, but it was a reply.

Greg couldn't help but be relieved in spite of himself. Sherlock sounded like his normal petulant self.

"We have no reason to believe that the killer will only kill female omegas," Greg snapped, sitting back down in the chair by the bed.

"Serial killers…" Sherlock began.

"Usually stick to one sex," Greg interrupted. "But there have been plenty who switch between sexes due to permutation. Like it or not, you're at risk."

Sherlock cracked an eye at him and looked annoyed. "I can take care of myself."

Greg snorted. "The fact that Bradstreet and I had to spend nearly twenty minutes performing CPR on you last night while we waited for the damned ambulance would suggest otherwise."

Then as though mentioning why Sherlock was in hospital had broken a dam Greg hadn't known was there, the anger and frustration poured forth in an unstoppable torrent of words. "What the hell is _*wrong*_ with you?!" he demanded. "You're not an idiot, you know how dangerous what you're doing is! And what the hell are you doing using anyway! Your mind…!" Greg stood up and started pacing. "You're one of the most brilliant people I've ever met! You have an incredible mind and a gift for observation like I've never seen! What the hell possessed you to just throw it all away? And for what? A temporary high? A few minutes of pleasure?"

Sherlock was looking toward the window, his lips compressed. He looked so young that it broke Greg's heart.

"Tell me," Greg said more calmly when Sherlock remained silent. "What can cocaine give you that's worth that amazing brain of yours?"

"It's because of my brain," Sherlock said, giving Greg a glare. He needed a haircut and the curl flopping into his eyes should have ruined the effect, somehow it didn't. He looked away again, the glare melting into something so lost it hurt to see. "You don't know what it's like," he snapped. "All the facts, all the things I see. I can't turn it off. I see everything, all the colours all the details all the time and I can't turn it off! And I don't just see, I can't _*not*_ observe! I can't stop the deductions, can't turn it off to get ten minutes of peace and quiet! It just keeps going all the time!"

Greg swallowed. This was one possibility he hadn't considered.

"And don't ask if I've ever tried lithium or some such thing," Sherlock continued, frowning down at the covers before him. "They started taking me to specialists when I was still a child. I've been on just about everything at some time or another. They don't help. Some of them muddle me so much that I can't think or make me into a zombie that can't deduce anything. But I can't live like that. Cocaine… it helps. It makes my thoughts flow like quicksilver, I can think and think and it doesn't hurt or tire me out. I can _*be*_ my thoughts. All of it right there at my fingertips and I don't want to block all the colours out then. I can see and deduce without it becoming too much."

Silence fell while Sherlock continued to stare at the coverlet and Greg struggled to find something to say. He'd been astonished, amazed by Sherlock's deductive abilities from the first day. But he'd never considered that it wasn't an effort, that it was something that happened without conscious volition. What would it be like to have a constant stream of extraneous information pounding into your head? All the time, every day and not be able to turn it off? It would drive him mad, he thought.

But this was what Sherlock lived with, every day. Was it any wonder he turned to drugs, desperate to turn it off or at the very least make it stop hurting?

Greg took a deep breath and tried to order his thoughts. He understood what Sherlock was saying, God did he ever. But…

"Do you want to die?" Greg asked bluntly. Sherlock looked up at him, clearly taken aback by the question. "Do you?" Greg asked again. "Because that's what's going to happen. The road you're on, it's a damn short one. Bradstreet and me, we saved you last night but we might not be in time next time. And I need to know if we should even bother trying to save you again."

Sherlock's lips tightened and he looked away again.

"I don't know," he said finally. "Sometimes I…" He shook his head. "It's not that I want to die as such but I'm not sure sometimes whether it's worth the fight to keep living."

Crap. That was _*not*_ the answer Greg had been expecting to hear, hoping to hear. If Sherlock had wanted to live then getting him to do what he had to do to survive was possible, but if he wasn't sure he even wanted to live…

"What about Sophie?" he asked.

Sherlock's head snapped back around. "What?" he demanded.

"I'm trying to find out who killed her, I am. I've been working myself and my team ragged on this case. But it's not enough and every day without a viable lead is one day closer to another body, you know that as well as I do."

Greg came over to stand over the bed, leaning down he placed his hands on either side of the pillow Sherlock's head rested on, not allowing him to look away. "You couldn't stop what happened to her. None of us could. Without evidence we can't do a damn thing. But the fact is, we need you. Sophie needs you. We couldn't stop her death but who's next? We have time here before the next death. I don't know how much but some. If you decide to check out now, who's going to stand for her?"

"You will," Sherlock said softly, but he was clearly shaken. This reached him in a way nothing else Greg had said had. "You'll stand for her."

Greg shook his head. "I can't. Not without you. God help me but I need your help."

Sherlock looked away again, staring off to the side. So young. Still so damned young. Twenty-five according to his chart but there were many kinds of age and maturity. Sherlock was practically an adult, knew how to navigate the dangers of life on the streets. But here and now, faced with emotions rather than practical knowledge, he was at a loss.

Greg decided to back off for the moment and give Sherlock some time to think.


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter 10

For the next three days Greg split his time between the yard and Sherlock's hospital room. Greg had seen withdrawal before, of course, but the doctor had been right. It was different when it was personal. As much as he knew that this was something Sherlock had done to himself, he still ached for the kid.

He and Ann split the time between them, trying to make sure there was always someone with him, at least during the first twenty-four hours.

During those days Greg had been afraid each time he left that he would return to find Sherlock's room empty and the kid back out chasing the next high. Every time that he came back to find Sherlock still there was a relief. Even the time he came in to find Ann holding a basin while Sherlock threw up. And to find that scene a relief told him just how nervous he really was.

Bradstreet helped when she could but as she had a hot case there was little enough she could do. She did, however, bring a pile of cold cases for Sherlock to look through. Generally he was not feeling well enough for anything, but the cases were something to help distract him from the misery of it all and that proved to be more than a blessing. And after the first two days when he began to feel a bit more himself, the cases were a Godsend as they were likely all that was keeping Sherlock from getting himself thrown out of hospital. Being miserably sick just made him harder to deal with and made it all the harder to remember that he was, supposedly, an adult. He was as petulant as a child, deducing every private thing about every nurse and technician who entered his room until they began passing off medications to Ann and Greg — which was very much against hospital policy — in order to avoid dealing with him. He did, however, much to Greg's amused surprise continue to refrain from deducing anything about Ann. The reticence was odd but welcome.

It was not until the fourth day, when Sherlock was feeling himself enough to have solved the first of the cases Bradstreet had brought by that Greg finally began to feel that the worst was over.

Which, of course, was when things started to go wrong again.

At first Greg didn't realise there was anything going on particularly. He noticed that he'd felt slight more ill at ease when one of the nurses came in to check Sherlock's vitals. Only relaxing again when she had left. It was odd and not at all like him but he was tired. So he put it down to that.

It was only when later when a technician came in to check the heart monitor that Greg realised that there was a problem. The man was an alpha and the moment he entered the room Greg wanted to tear his throat out. He had to clench his hands into fists to keep from attacking the man.

Sherlock, who was entirely engrossed in a case file didn't appear to notice a thing for which Greg was grateful.

Uncertain what was going on Greg decided to head down to the canteen. A few moments to collect himself and figure out why he was feeling this way wouldn't hurt. It was unexpectedly difficult to leave the room though. It was as though something in him was afraid something would happen while he was gone. He actually found himself checking the corridor as he headed to the elevator, making sure the tech wasn't around.

He started to feel a bit more like himself as he got a sandwich and coffee. Still, he couldn't sit downstairs and eat. He felt he had to get back up to the room. It wasn't like him to worry like this. His mind worried at the problem as he headed back upstairs.

It wasn't until he reentered Sherlock's room and took a deep breath that he realised what was happening. It had been growing over the course of the afternoon and he hadn't realised it until he had left and come back. He knew that smell.

Of course, he was well aware that Sherlock was going to go into heat at some point but what he had not expected was for it to happen this soon.

He wasn't in heat yet, thank God, but he was ramping up toward it and Greg had not yet found a place for him at one of the few omega retreats that could handle an omega going through withdrawal.

Shit.

Now what?

What was more, Greg himself was going to have to get out of here soon. Sherlock was not family or pack. It wouldn't be long before the pheromones would start to affect him in more than just making him protective. And just the thought of that... with *_Sherlock*_ of all people... The idea actually made him a little sick.

He was going to push the button for a nurse but changed his mind quickly. Having a nurse in the room at this point would probably not be a good idea.

He could still see the door of Sherlock's room from the closest nurse's station thankfully. He was too worried at this point to want to go where he couldn't make sure another alpha was not encroaching. Damn, this is not good.

"Can you page Dr. Carmichael, please?" Greg asked the nurse.

"One moment. Let me see where he is," she said with the slightly pitying smile all the nurses had been giving him once they realised that he was the pack alpha of the most recalcitrant omega in existence. After a few moments of tapping she shook her head. "I'm sorry, Dr. Carmichael has already left for the evening. Is there a problem?"

"Yes," Greg said with feeling. "Sherlock's... that is... He's starting to go into heat early."

The nursed nodded. "Yes, of course. I understand," she told him. Of course, she did. He wondered how often this happened around here. This whole corridor was for betas and omegas only so obviously it happened too often to allow alphas in with the omega patients.

"He's not in heat yet," Greg told her. "But he's starting to produce early heat pheromones. I'm not sure what to do. He wasn't supposed to go into heat for another week. I don't have a place at a retreat for him yet."

The nurse nodded. "I'll contact Dr. Aali. She's one of our omega specialists."

"Thanks."

Heading back to Sherlock's room Greg began to wonder if he should stay in the hall. He didn't think he had anything to worry about just yet. God, he hoped he didn't. Unfortunately, until this new crisis was dealt with he couldn't exactly stay away.

When he got back he found Sherlock talking on the phone to Bradstreet regarding the case file he had just been looking at. Greg wondered for a moment where Sherlock had got a mobile until his hand went to his own pocket.

"Did you pick my pocket?" he demanded when Sherlock got off the phone.

"Of course, I did," Sherlock said, not bothering to look up from the new file he was already studying. He tossed Greg's phone carelessly onto the coverlet at the foot of the bed where Greg snatched it up.

"Sherlock, you can't just..." Greg don't bother finishing. Sherlock wasn't listening and he seriously doubted he would care what Greg said even if he had been.

Dr. Aali was, thankfully, both prompt and also omega, so her entrance failed to raise Greg's hackles.

There was only so much she could do, though.

"I don't dare to give him any suppressants at this point. The best we can do is use a masker. All it will do though is tone it down a bit."

Sherlock was ignoring them entirely and Greg finally turned on him in annoyance. "Don't you care what's going on?" he demanded.

"Yes," Sherlock said flatly still not looking up from the file in front of him. "That's why I'm focused. If I'm going to spend three days insensible to what's actually important then I want to get as much done before then as possible."

There was really no answer to that so Greg just turned back to the doctor. "What about other alphas, those on staff and other patients? He can't stay here through his heat but I haven't been able to get a place in a retreat yet."

Dr. Aali frowned considering. "It's early enough that we'll be alright for tonight. I'll simply put a flag on his file that no alpha staff members are allowed in here. Since this part of the wing is for betas and omegas only other patients won't be a problem. I'll go and get a masker now and see what I can do about finding him a place in one of the retreats. There's probably little chance of getting him somewhere with specialists for his situation at this point, but I'll see what I can do."

Dr. Aali was back again shortly with an injection but as she had said, all it did was tone down the pheromones Sherlock was producing, not alter the nature of them. By tomorrow afternoon at the latest he'd be driving any alpha near him into a mating frenzy. Which meant that Greg himself would have to make any and all arrangements now and get the hell away from him before...

Greg stopped pacing.

He had to get out before he started reacting to the pheromones. But that's just the thing, he already was reacting to them. He shouldn't be, not yet. It should smell good, alluring even, but that was all. Greg had smelled omega heat pheromones before. They'd made him so damn horny it had taken all his willpower to call for a beta officer to deal with the situation and get the hell out of there before he did something he really did not want to do.

True, it was early on and far too early to drive any alpha into a frenzy but he should be feeling *_something*_ of the kind. There should be at least a faint stirring of arousal by now. The scent at the very least should be enticing on some level. It wasn't.

Oh it was affecting him, Greg felt that if an alpha were to walk through that door right now he would have a hell of a time not attacking them. But he did not find the scent enticing or arousing in any way. The alpha part of his nature was urging him to protect only. There wasn't the slightest desire for anything more.

That was all wrong. The only time the scent of an omega in heat failed to rouse even a flicker of desire from an alpha was in the case of close family. Even within packs there should be some desire to...

No. No, he was wrong. There was one other possibility.

And that had everything to do with pack.

Slowly, Greg eased himself into a chair.

The only way an alpha wouldn't react to an omega member of his pack who was not a close relative was if that pack member _*was intrinsic*_. To an intrinsic alpha the scent of the heat pheromones of an omega who belonged to them would do no more than rouse the need to defend. And that would start with the first shift toward heat.

Unbidden, facts began to go through his mind; things that had not really fit, things that had not really made sense.

The fact that he had felt a need to protect Sherlock... well that could be put down to the fact that he both liked the kid and just maybe because some part of the alpha in him had recognised that he was an omega. But what about the fact that he had not thought twice about bringing him into his territory, in to his home? It had been odd, even Ann had pointed that out.

He thought back to how long he had sat in front of the fire that night, Sherlock asleep on the couch. And he thought about how he himself had slept that night. He always slept lightly when they had guests. Even people he trusted, like Ann's parents. It wasn't that it bothered him to have them under his roof. Far from it. But it was instinct to sleep lightly simply because there were non-pack members in his home.

The night Sherlock stayed with them though... Greg hadn't slept lightly that night. If anything, he had slept more soundly than was his wont. He'd gone to bed feeling content in a way he hadn't really thought about until now. At the time he'd been worried about other things. He'd just written it off as a fluke, but now...?

Then he remembered how Sherlock had responded that evening. Greg hadn't Commanded him to go upstairs and shower but he had been unable to keep a bit of a Command growl out of his voice. And against everything Greg knew about Sherlock, he had obeyed. And he had done so quickly, as though it was, at least in part, a knee jerk reaction to do so. Then all evening, a look from Greg had been enough to keep Sherlock from pushing things with Ann. Yes, being an omega _*may*_ explain some of that as well as the fact that he was in a dominant alpha's territory... but it didn't explain enough of it. Especially not with Sherlock.

Greg had put it down to coming down off a massive high but now that he thought about it... About how odd was it that Sherlock had fallen asleep on the couch so quickly... Sherlock was usually so very much on his guard around everyone, even Greg. Sitting in Greg's territory, though, he had let that guard drop so completely that he had allowed Greg some control over him and then fallen asleep with Greg in the room.

None of that made any sense, not really.

Not unless Sherlock was his.

_*Really*_ his.

Greg hadn't stopped to think the night he and Bradstreet had found Sherlock. He'd responded as any alpha would when dealing with a pack member. It was why no one, not the EMTs, the doctors or the staff here questioned Greg's role in Sherlock's life. Without thinking he acted like Sherlock's alpha. And what was more, for all Sherlock was testy with him, Sherlock hadn't once done anything since he'd been here to indicated that Greg _*wasn't*_ his alpha.

Greg wiped a hand over his face. He had never really wanted the responsibility of being a pack alpha to begin with, but the idea of someone truly belonging to him, of the bonds that came with intrinsic pack... Frankly, the idea terrified him. How could he take on the weight of such a responsibility? It was permanent, life changing. He couldn't accept that kind of responsibility. He didn't want it. But... but Ann had been right. He wasn't willing to give Sherlock up. Not at this moment. And if he knew anything about intrinsic packs, he never would be.

Dear God, what was he going to do?

He didn't have long to worry about it.

The door opened and Greg was pulled to his feet, not so much by the unexpected arrival but by the way Sherlock tensed, his head snapping up and the pages he had been holding slipping from his fingers.

Greg had stepped between Sherlock and the door before he even had a chance to see who it was who had arrived. It was simple instinct propelling him, not conscious thought.

The man who stepped into the room was impeccably dressed in a suit far too fine and perfectly fitted to be anything but bespoke. And honestly, who wore a three-piece suit at ten o'clock in the evening? He was, perhaps, a little taller than Greg, brown hair perfectly trimmed and ruthlessly tamed, bland tie carefully and tightly knotted around his neck. An umbrella seemed to be serving the purpose of a walking stick and he leaned on it slightly as he observed Greg with cool civility.

What was really odd was that there was no scent. None. The man before him was putting off no pheromones at all as far as Greg could tell. It was almost as though he had no permutation. Greg knew there were high end suppressants that could result in a complete lack of any permutation pheromones but they were expensive and not easy to come by. Greg had never guessed just how confusing that complete lack of scent would be.

"Good evening, Detective Inspector," he said with a slight nod to him. "Sherlock," he said with another, not quite so deferential nod toward the bed. The voice was rich and cultured and Greg was sure he had heard it somewhere before, but he knew he had never seen the man before. He would have remembered.

"Go away," Sherlock snapped. "I don't want you here!"

Greg's spine stiffened. He had no idea who this man was but every instinct he had was screaming at him to get him away from Sherlock. Sherlock was going into heat and he didn't want this man here. That was all that mattered to the alpha part of him at this precise moment.

"Who are you?" he demanded.

"It doesn't matter," Sherlock said. "Just leave."

The man brought his umbrella in front of him and rested both his hands on it.

"Now, now Sherlock," he said in a supercilious tone that put Greg's teeth on edge. "You are in hospital due to an overdose and are about to go into heat. You require my assistance."

Sherlock struggled to push the covers off him and tried to get to his feet. "I don't need _*anything*_ from you!" he hissed.

"You cannot be without a pack in such a time..." the man began.

Greg stepped forward placing himself directly in front of the man, blocking even his sight of Sherlock.

"He is not without pack."

The words were out of his mouth before he had a chance to think about them. The idea that anyone thought Sherlock was alone and unguarded raising his hackles.

A raised eyebrow was his only reply but Sherlock's scrambling efforts to disentangle himself from the sheets behind him stopped.

For a moment the three of them stood there as a tableau and a small portion of Greg's brain was screaming at him that this _*was not*_ what he wanted. He did not want to take responsibility for Sherlock. But that part was far smaller than the instinct driving him to protect the kid from this apparent threat.

"Do you then claim him as pack?" the man asked finally, as though amused.

"Yes." If it meant keeping this man away from Sherlock he would say just about anything at this point. They'd deal with disentangling himself from Sherlock after it was over. Besides, just saying it here and now didn't make them pack. To become pack Sherlock would have to...

"I acknowledge the claim."

The words were said softly and for a second they didn't register at all. Then Greg turned, unable to keep a soft gasp from escaping.

The words were ritual. The alpha claimed and the pack member acknowledged that claim. It was how packs were made at their most basic level. Greg had claimed Sherlock to get this man out of here, he had never expected Sherlock to actually acknowledge that claim.

Sherlock was sitting on the edge of the bed, looking far too fragile in the hospital gown he wore. The expression on his face was somewhere between confusion and defiance.

For a moment they stared at one another.

_*Mine.*_

Greg felt the weight he had been avoiding all his adult life settle over him.

He loved Ann but she was his only to the extent that she chose to be. This was different. And he'd been right, the weight of it was indeed heavy.

Except... he'd expected to feel weighed down, trapped by such a weight. He didn't. He felt as though it stiffened something inside him. He didn't feel weaker, he felt stronger.

As he turned back to the man in the doorway he felt his shoulders drop at the release of internal tension even as his spine straighten under the responsibility he now carried.

He met the man's sardonic gaze without flinching. At that moment, he knew with unfailing certainty that he could and would kill this man if he had to. It should have scared him. It didn't.

After a moment the man bowed his head again just a little, this nod one of respect to a dominant alpha instead of sardonic greeting. How he could put that much meaning into a simple tip of the head Greg had no idea, but he did.

"Then it seems I must stand as witness to both claim and acknowledgement. Good evening to you both."

As soon as the door shut behind the man the anger drained away and Greg found it was all that had been keeping him on his feet. He collapsed into the visitor's chair and stared at Sherlock.

The kid scowled. "If you think for one minute that this means you can tell me what to do..." he began indignantly.

Greg just started to laugh. And continued to do so until he was holding his sides in pain, spurred on by Sherlock's affronted expression.


	11. Chapter 11

_Merry Christmas! Happy Hanukkah! Happy Kwanzaa! Happy Three Kings Day! Happy St. Lucia Day! Happy Yalda! Happy Solstice! And a Joyful Yuletide to all!_

_I hope you're all comfortably ensconced and ready to settle in for a happy holiday season. The longest night is passed and we can now buckle down to celebrate the slow but sure return of the light. Now if only February didn't stand between us and summer. *sigh*_

_I LIVE for feedback so please give me a little Christmas prezzie by leaving some. What do you think of all this? Is the whole intrinsic pack idea working for you? Who do you think the killer is? *g*_

_Due to holiday madness it may be a week or two before I can get the next chapter finished and out to you. So, I'll see you all in the New Year._

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 11<strong>

Ann stopped dead in the doorway when she arrived twenty minutes later, her eyes widening with sudden concern.

Greg rose and went to her. Sherlock was once again focused on the files before him and ignored them both.

Taking the shopping bag she had brought out of her hand and leaving it on the floor beside the door, Greg pulled her to a waiting room just down the hall where he could watch the door to Sherlock's room but still talk to Ann without interruption.

"Greg, you can't be in there, he..."

"We have much bigger problems than my response to Sherlock," Greg said. "And as it turns out, that's one problem we don't actually have."

"Explain," she said folding her arms.

Greg took a breath. "He's mine. Intrinsically."

Ann opened her mouth before shutting again. She repeated that a second time before taking a deep breath and nodded to herself. "Okay."

Greg just waited for it to sink in.

After another moment she finally looked back at him. "You know, I supposed I should have seen that one coming."

"Well I certainly didn't," Greg snorted.

Ann gave a little laugh. "With how you are with him? Inviting him into our home as you did?" She shook her head. "No it makes sense now that I'm looking at it. Still, I have to admit that I don't see him being willing to acknowledge..."

"He did," Greg interrupted. That stopped her mid-sentence again and she looked almost more shocked this time. Greg couldn't blame her.

"He did?" she demanded. "When did all this happen?"

Quickly, Greg went through the events of the evening.

Ending with, "and the first thing he said to me after that was to tell me that there was no way I was going to be telling him what to do."

Ann pinched the bridge of her nose, a gesture Greg recognised as one of his own. Then she laughed. "Bloody hell. *_Of course*_ he did. No one who actually belonged to you would put up with a controlling alpha." She shook her head before slipping her arms around his waist. "You know, there was a time when all of that would have surprised me. But after the last few months... Greg, love, when did mysterious people and drug addict geniuses become a part of our lives?"

Greg chuckled, wrapping his arms around her and breathing in the comforting scent of her. "When I started working with Sherlock apparently. Sorry about that."

"At this point, I'm not sure I wouldn't miss hearing about your run ins with shadowy types," she said, pressing a light kiss to his lips. "Do you think that that may have been the mysterious Mr. Holmes?"

"I'm sure of it," Greg said. "I couldn't figure out just where I'd heard his voice before until after he left. Stupid of me, but I wasn't really thinking straight with Sherlock upset and feeling as though he were being threatened." Greg shook his head. "But that was definitely him. I'd be willing to bet that we have him to thank for the private room."

"That's a bet I wouldn't be willing to take. What does Sherlock have to say about all of this?"

"Nothing. He's refusing to do anything but study those damn files."

Ann rolled her eyes. "I know you don't like ordering people around but you'll have to learn to be more forceful with him." She pulled away with another quick kiss and marched back to the room. Greg followed and shut the door behind him as Ann snatched up the bag she had brought.

"That guy who was here, what is he to you?" she demanded putting the bag down directly on top of the file Sherlock was studying. He glared at her but she simply stared back, entirely unfazed. "Clothes," she said motioning to the bag. "I thought that you could probably use some pants and pyjamas at the very least."

"I do not require..." Sherlock began with the brittle haughtiness Greg knew all too well at this point.

"We're pack," Ann snapped, not allowing him to finish his automatic objection. They'd had this fight before over the boots and then the socks and finally the backpack, so she knew exactly what he was going to say. "Or so Greg tells me. There's no such thing as charity between packmates. Now, who was that man here before?"

Greg leaned against the wall by the door amused but also keenly interested in the answer.

Sherlock scowled at the bag in front of him before glancing between Greg and Ann.

"My brother," he admitted with bad grace.

_*That*_ surprised both of them.

"That guy is your _*brother*_?" Greg demanded.

"Or so Mummy always insisted," Sherlock muttered, poking into the bag before him as though expecting it to be packed with explosive rather than pants. "I always preferred to think he had been left on the doorstep before my parents managed to have me."

Ann snorted. "And thus the fervent hope of younger siblings the world over," she said, sitting down. Greg couldn't help a twitch of the lips even as he tried to keep a straight face. The idea of little brother Sherlock... He just couldn't wrap his head around it.

"How much older is he?" he asked.

"Seven years," Sherlock grumbled.

"And who exactly was the woman at the station when Bradstreet arrested you?" Greg continued, not willing to back down when Sherlock seemed in the mood to actually answer questions. "Antonia, or whatever her name actually is."

Sherlock shrugged, finally deigning to look into the bag in front of him. "One of his minions."

"He's the one who called me," Greg told him. "He told me where to find you the other night."

"Of course he did," Sherlock snorted. "I knew that as soon as you told me what had happened."

"And you didn't feel the need to tell us this why exactly?" Ann demanded.

Sherlock just gave her a look.

"Why should you care who called you?" he muttered in Greg's direction.

"Why should I...?" It was Greg's turn to pinch the bridge of his nose. "Sherlock, this man has been invading my business, the yard's private files concerning me, and he has my phone number. Something that you can't get easily as the private numbers of police officers are supposed to be confidential. And, as of two weeks ago he has apparently invaded DI Bradstreet's privacy just as thoroughly."

Sherlock shrugged. "It's what he does. I did warn you that he was dangerous."

"Yes," Greg conceded. "But you also said he was a government operative out to hire you."

"He is," Sherlock snapped, clearly affronted by the suggestion that he was somehow lying. Then he wilted slightly under Greg's glare. "It's just that he's unfortunately family as well."

When Greg continued to glare Sherlock pushed away both files and bag to glare back.

"You have no idea what it's like," he snapped. "Mycroft has the kind of power you can't imagine. He can do pretty much whatever he wants, have pretty much whatever he wants. He's inherently evil. And he's always been there, always breathing down my neck. It's not just that he wants to force me into some awful government job where my brain would stagnate. He's..." Sherlock made a frustrated gesture as though at a loss for anything bad enough to say. "If he had his way I'd live in some little box somewhere, a miniature *_him*_." Sherlock's tone made it clear he could think of no worse fate.

"Mycroft?" Ann asked, latching onto what Greg felt was probably the least important and yet somehow most interesting bit of Sherlock's tirade. She shook her head. "Your parents were strange people."

Sherlock gave her a disgusted look. "Mummy chose them. They're family names." His tone suggested that if his mother had chosen them then there could not _*possibly*_ be anything wrong with either name. Greg tried to imagine the kind of mother who raised children like these two. His mind came up blank.

"Where are you parents?" Ann asked then, wisely not pursuing the topic of the Holmes brothers' names.

"Dead," Sherlock said, picking at the bag again. "Father died when I was very young and mother when I was in my teens." His attempt to sound utterly indifference to these facts failed miserably.

"And who was your guardian then?" Greg asked, already knowing the answer.

"Mycroft, of course," Sherlock said unhappily.

So, sometime during his teenage years he had lost a mother he clearly adored and been left in the care of a significantly older brother, Greg thought. There were still large gaps between that and Sherlock ending up a homeless drug addict by the age of twenty-five. Still, it was clear that his brother, whatever his faults, was trying to help Sherlock. It was just that he didn't seem to go about in a way that made a great deal of sense. But then again, if he was Sherlock's brother he probably was not exactly a model of normalcy either.

As a police officer, Greg had seen plenty of dysfunctional families. This one, however, seemed to need a whole new category.

"But you do have family," Ann said. "You even have family that cares about you. How did you end up on the streets?"

Sherlock said nothing, grabbing the bag Ann had brought and escaping into the closet-like en-suite. Ann folded her arms, looking annoyed and Greg knew she had no intention of allowing this to drop. He thought about asking her not to push but decided against it. So far, Sherlock was answering their questions and he was going to take advantage of this mood for as long as it lasted.

"Well?" she predictably demanded when Sherlock came back out. Flannel pyjama bottoms and plain, round-necked t-shirt should not have made him look younger than a hospital gown. They did anyway.

Sherlock flopped down onto the bed again and if it had not been for the fine trembling he couldn't quite seem to hide, one would have thought that he had done it entirely for dramatic effect, instead of because the walk to the loo and back had all but exhausted him.

"He thought it would teach me a lesson," Sherlock muttered finally. Then a grim sort of smile appeared, darkly self-satisfied. "He kicked me out after I sold an heirloom watch to pay for cocaine. He thought I'd come running back after a single night on the streets, lesson learned."

Greg rolled his eyes. Mycroft may have all the power anyone could want but he was clearly as given to stupid mistakes as the rest of them. And only Sherlock could sound proud of choosing to be homeless.

"How long ago was that?" he asked.

This time the smile grew into a positively triumphant grin. "Almost three years ago," Sherlock answered with immense satisfaction.

"Sir?"

Greg stopped on his way back to Sherlock's room to see Dr. Aali motioning him over to where she stood by the floor's main nurse's station.

"I received a call from the Mech Clinic regarding Sherlock," she told him when he walked over. "I'm so glad you were able to get him in there. It will make a huge difference in the progress of his recovery to have him seen by a specialist."

For a moment Greg could think of nothing to say and just nodded dumbly. The Mech Clinic was the omega retreat specialising in helping omegas going through withdrawal that Dr. Carmichael had given him information for when Sherlock had first arrived. Greg had called them, of course, but there hadn't been a chance of getting him in. They weren't taking any more new NHS patients until sometime next year and the waiting list for those openings was long already. Greg had asked without much hope how much it would be to have Sherlock there as a private patient. The answer had made him wince.

How on earth...? Then he realised. Holmes, it had to be. Like the private room here, there was no other reasonable explanation. Sherlock might insist that his brother was evil, and it was true that his form of care was decidedly chilly to Greg's mind, but evil he clearly was not. He honestly seemed to want to make sure that Sherlock got the best of care. That had to count for something.

Dr. Aali continued on, apparently unaware that Sherlock having a place at the Mech was news to him. "I'll be getting off at six this morning, but I'll leave a note for Dr. Carmichael. As the primary physician in charge of Sherlock's case here he'll need to sign off on the transfer. An ambulance will be ready to take him to the Mech at eleven tomorrow morning. Although I have stated that the EMTs must be betas or omegas it will still be best for Sherlock to have a good dose of a masker before he leaves. I'll leave instructions that he is to be given it forty minutes before he leaves so it will be at full effect during his transfer. However, I want you to be aware of this so that if someone is not by with his dose by 10:30 you can ring for a nurse."

While she spoke Greg was able to pull himself together and he held out his hand to the doctor. "That would be great. Thank you for all your help."

She took his hand with an understanding smile. "I'm happy to do whatever I can to help."

Before Greg could head back to the room, Dr. Aali spoke again. "He has a long road to recovery in front of him. But he has a good alpha and a strong pack. That can make all the difference."

"Thanks," Greg replied feeling an odd mixture of pride and embarrassment. It still felt odd to think of Sherlock as pack and he sure as hell did not feel like a good alpha. The kid had nearly died only a few days ago. And for all that he was pushing forward as though Sherlock were going to get clean he had no reason to believe that that was the case. He hoped it was the case, prayed it was the case. The fact that Sherlock was still here was promising but he was an addict.

As Greg turned the corner to head back to Sherlock's room he saw a young man hesitating outside Sherlock's door. He turned at Greg's approach and Greg reassessed the visitor's age downwards. A boy. Fifteen or sixteen at most. While he was observing he was also being observed and he knew the moment the kid made him as a cop. He turned and ran in the opposite direction, trainers skidding on the linoleum.

It was automatic and unthinking to give chase. The boy threw himself around the corner at the end of the hallway and Greg swung around it after him, his own shoes barely able to keep purchase on the too slick floor. As he did, however, he saw that his pursuit was for nought. A nurse had just stepped off the elevator and was nearly knocked over by the kid skidding into it. He must have hit the button to close the doors as they began to shut immediately and Greg had no chance of stopping him. He slowed to a stop and fielded the nurse's incredulous surprise with a shrug.

It was possible that the boy had been an alpha drawn by the scent of early heat but Greg doubted it. For one thing the scent was not strong enough yet to extend much beyond the room Sherlock was in. As long as the door was closed, there was little evidence of it outside that one room. And they had been very careful about keeping the door closed for that very reason.

Besides, Greg reflected as he headed back the way he had come, it was well past visiting hours now. What would he have been doing here in the first place? That and the fact that the way he had been dressed, worn jeans that were clearly too large for him, a hoody far too big for him over what had looked to be a smaller hoody under that. Trainers that looked like they were held together more by duct tape than fabric... That was more the kind of cloths of someone who lived rough rather than someone who would be visiting friends or family in hospital. Particularly so late at night.

Ann was reading when he finally did make it back to the room and gave him a questioning look, obviously seeing something in his face which spoke of his confusion. He just shook his head.

Sherlock had finally fallen asleep a little while ago and now lay with pages of one of the files spread around him on the bed.

Greg began gathering them up, placing them carefully back in the folder they'd come from. This particular body had not been found until nearly a week after death and had, therefore, been in an advanced state of decomposition. While it clearly didn't bother Sherlock, Greg doubted the nurses would particularly want to see the pictures when they came to check on him.

It was late and as much as Greg worried about Sherlock, both he and Ann needed sleep.

He cocked a head toward the door and Ann nodded, gathering up her purse, coat and book.

In the car on the way home he explained both about the clinic and the visitor.

"One of Sherlock's contacts?" she asked.

Greg just shrugged. "How would he have known where to find him?"

"Well, I imagine it's not unknown that he was taken away in an ambulance. I doubt that there was exactly an attempt to hide it."

"True," Greg agreed. "But unless they know his full name, or at least his last name, how were they going to find where he was in hospital?"

"Maybe some of them do know his last name," Ann said.

Greg just shrugged. It was possible even though it grated to think that Sherlock would have been willing to share information with his various homeless contacts that he hadn't been willing to share with Greg. Which, he reminded himself, was a damn stupid way to feel.

After a time Ann sighed. "At least that brother of his is useful for something. I'll feel better once Sherlock is in that clinic."

Greg couldn't have agreed more.


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12**

For all that alphas had traditionally been given preferential treatment in the workplace, it was a fact that those who had packs were not always the most reliable of employees. It was only their natural roles as leaders within society that meant they weren't considered unreliable. The fact was, that these days those employers who looked at nothing but productivity actually preferred hiring betas to alphas. Still, though, alphas continued to dominate the most active and prestigious professions and their employers, for the most part, took the occasional interference of pack responsibilities as a matter of course.

In Greg's case, this had never been an issue. With the sole exception of his honeymoon, he had never taken any significant time off and had never — before four days ago — asked for any special leeway due to his pack. This was probably the reason he had managed to get himself put on light duty for a few days due to "a pack emergency" without having to answer too many questions. His DCI had been so surprised by the request and the fact that Greg of all people would even ask such a thing that he had simply allowed it. Of course, the fact that Greg had come straight from hospital the morning after Sherlock's overdose and had looked like hell as a result probably helped as well.

He was not, however, entirely without responsibilities to his job and there were a few things Greg needed to see to the morning of Sherlock's transfer. He headed in early therefore so that he could be back at hospital well before eleven.

He was heading back to his office after consulting on a minor case Jones was handling solo when he checked, seeing someone sitting in his visitor's chair.

No one should have been in his office. He always kept the door locked when he wasn't in there. His office, like the personal office of any alpha, was an extension of his territory and he bristled slightly at the intrusion. As he approached however he nearly laughed. It wasn't that it was actually all that funny to see Mycroft Holmes sitting in his office, his assistant standing beside him — well, it was but not in a laughing way — it was simply the fact that the man had had the gall to enter a police officer's locked office and then calmly wait for said officer to get back. For the first time, Greg could almost believe that he and Sherlock were brothers after all. The bristling irritation was mostly subsumed by amusement.

"You know," he said conversationally as he entered the room, shutting the door behind him, "you could both be arrested for trespassing."

The man raised one supercilious eyebrow at him and there was no response at all from the woman standing at his elbow. "It would never hold up in court," Holmes said smoothly. "Not that it would ever get that far. You've seen how quickly I can get Sherlock out of trouble. Imagine how quickly I could get myself out of a similar predicament; and imagine what having arrested me would do to the future career of any officer who attempted it."

The words were mildly spoken, but gave Greg a momentary shiver nonetheless. Actually, he couldn't imagine what it would do to his career and frankly he didn't want to. He sat down behind his desk, fully aware that his attempt to take the position of power in this encounter had failed miserably.

Like before Holmes smelled of nothing whatsoever except for the faintest hint of some expensive cologne. It wasn't common for anyone other than betas to wear scent but Greg knew better than to imagine that that meant anything here. The woman standing beside him was certainly a beta but her scent was one of the most enticing beta scents he had ever encountered. Had it been that way the first time he had met her and he simply had not noticed? He honestly wasn't sure.

"What can I do for you?" Greg demanded. "I don't have a lot of time this morning."

"Because you wish to be back in time for the transfer," Holmes said nodding. "I entirely agree that it would be best if you were there and so I will not take too much of your time." So saying he motioned to his assistant who reached into the briefcase she held and pulled out a sheaf of documents, handing them across the desk to Greg. With surprise, Greg found himself looking at the documents for formal pack acknowledgement. Glancing quickly through he found Sherlock's signature already on them. Well, what he assumed was Sherlock's signature. He'd never actually seen Sherlock's signature before so he couldn't judge its authenticity. He found himself glancing at Holmes dubiously.

"I assure you that it's perfectly legal, Detective Inspector," Holmes said placidly. "I had my assistant visit Sherlock early this morning to obtain his signature on the documents. I felt that if Sherlock were to go through rehabilitation under your protection it would be best if all the paperwork was appropriately filed beforehand."

Greg set aside the documents and studied his visitor.

"Why are you here?" Greg asked finally.

Holmes raised an eyebrow at him. "I thought we had just covered that."

"No," Greg answered, sitting back in his chair and studying the man in front of him. "You've given me some paperwork – thank you for that by the way I'll get it filed immediately – and listed a course of action you want me to take and told me why you wanted me to take it. As it happens I agree with you. But you personally didn't have to come here for that. You could have sent someone," he waived toward the assistant, "as you did when Sherlock was arrested. Why come all the way to the yard yourself?"

Holmes regarded him steadily as if waiting for Greg to back down. Greg just looked back. Sherlock had tried to stare him down on multiple occasions. Usually, Greg gave in to keep the peace but he was who and what he was. There was no way in hell he was backing down to this man.

Many alphas used their Command growl and the power of their pheromones to control and dominate those around them. Greg generally didn't. And he didn't now.

No growl, no scent. No trappings of social control. He just sat back and allowed the dominant force of personality that could, if necessary, compel compliance from those around him to show through. It was what many forgot about dominance, Greg had found. The use of voice, pheromones, physical presence and all the rest... They were nothing but tools, aids. What made an alpha truly a force to be reckoned with was inside. It was a steady core that couldn't be moved or shaken. Greg was a strong man but it wasn't his body or pheromones that made him so. And now... since he'd finally accepted the weight of responsibility for someone who truly was _*his*_... He'd never felt stronger. Never felt more secure in who he was as a man, an alpha, a pack leader. He knew that, when it came down to it, there was nothing this man or any other could do to take from him what was his or alter who he was.

So he made no effort to dominate the man in front of him. He didn't have to. All he did was sit quietly and wait. Let Holmes look all he liked. Let him deduce whatever he wanted and draw whatever conclusions he pleased. Greg had no doubt which of them could stare the longest.

After only a minute or so, Holmes glanced away, eyes dropping in a subtle display of submission. It happened a lot sooner than Greg would have expected. This was not a man who could be cowed that easily. The slight smile that quirked the man's lips as he glanced away told Greg that he'd either passed some test or merely that he'd somehow amused the other man. He honestly couldn't tell.

"I doubted that you'd have time to see to the paperwork yourself today," Holmes said. "Personally, I'd rather not give Sherlock a chance to change his mind. I'd like to see him safely within a pack before..."

Greg didn't let him finish.

"Again, _*you*_ didn't have to come here for that." The look he received was enough to tell him that this was not a man used to being interrupted.

"If you would allow me to finished, Detective Inspector?" he said in a deceptively mild voice that didn't hide his displeasure. Greg had a sudden vision of the man petting a Persian cat. That was all he seemed lacking at this point for him to look a proper Bond villain.

Greg held back smile and motioned for the man to continue. From the brief flash of annoyance in the other man's eyes he was willing to bet he hadn't hidden his smile well enough and Holmes was not pleased at being found amusing.

"As I was saying, I'd rather not give Sherlock the opportunity to change his mind under the present circumstances. However, I do admit to the desire to have the chance to... shall we say size you up. If you are to be my brother's alpha," Greg raised his eyebrows at the 'if', "then I wanted the chance to get a feel for what kind of man you were."

Greg snorted. "And all my reports, evaluations, and confidential tests didn't give you an idea of what kind of man I am?"

"No," Holmes said with a tight-lipped smile. "They did not. They all give only one aspect of your character and all of it filtered through other people's perceptions. When you were merely an associate of Sherlock's that was enough. Now, it is not."

"And you didn't get what you needed last night?" Greg asked mildly.

"No," Holmes said again. "Last night you were protecting an omega in the early stages of heat from a perceived threat. It was immediate. You were, in fact, on the edge of becoming feral. Today you are not."

Greg shook his head in automatic denial. Feral was a state of instinct driven behaviour that could overcome a person — nearly always a member of the breeding genders — when those who belonged to them were in immediate danger. It was something most usually associated with alphas protecting their bondmates or omegas protecting their children. He wanted to argue that he'd been nowhere near going feral but doubted the man before him would believe him. Besides, remembering standing there waiting calmly to find out whether he was going to kill the man in front of him with his bare hands, knowing he would without hesitation... Well, alright. Maybe Holmes had a point. But that didn't mean Greg had to admit it.

"So," Greg asked after a moment. "What do you want to know then?"

Holmes raised an eyebrow in a supercilious manner Greg recognised from Sherlock. He was beginning to see how the man before him could have raised the prickly youth he knew.

"Did Sherlock tell you how he ended up on the streets?" Holmes asked.

Surprised by the apparent non sequitur Greg nodded. "He said, you threw him out after you caught him stealing from you to pay for drugs. You thought a night or two on the streets would scare him straight."

"More or less," Holmes said. "He pawned an antique watch that had been in the family for four generations. There were far more valuable things he could have taken, but he took that because he believed that that would bother me more than if he had taken something of little or no familial significance." The man studied the head of his umbrella, twirling it absently. "He could have come home at any time. His room is, in fact, still in the deplorable state he left it. Though the housekeeper did find it necessary to remove one or two of the ongoing experiments and some of the more volatile chemicals."

He looked up then and met Greg's eyes and for a moment he looked terribly tired.

"I actually had him brought home three times, two on other occasions when he... shall we say over-indulged, only to find him gone again as soon as he was physically capable of running."

Greg didn't know what to say. The thought of it, of seeing one's family self-destruct in that manner and be able to do nothing about it... He'd had a taste of it over the last few months, worrying over someone he wasn't yet able to recognise as his. Still...

"I'm sorry," Greg said finally for lack of any other response.

Holmes just gave a small shrug, the exhaustion Greg had seen a moment before gone. "I am telling you this only so you will understand how utterly unprecedented it is that Sherlock has remained in hospital these last several days. That he is intending to go through with your plans for him, at least so far as the next few days go. You will understand my curiosity to know what it is about you that gives you such a hold over Sherlock."

He rose to his feet then and placed a business card on Greg's desk. Picking it up Greg found that it had no name on it, just a number.

"You are free to call me at any time. No matter what Sherlock may say, I do want only what is best for him." He nodded once. "Good day, Detective Inspector. If you file that paperwork before the end of the day I will see that it is expedited."

Greg sat for some few minutes twirling the card between his fingers. The fact was he had no idea himself what it was that made Sherlock his. What was it that made him listen to Greg, even if only a little, when he'd refused to allow his own brother to put a roof over his head when the alternative was to be homeless? He didn't know.

He'd found himself googling for information on intrinsic packs the night before but learned nothing he didn't already know. There were a hundred theories but little solid data. The bond could not be anticipated, there was no way of knowing where or when it would develop or why it appeared between one alpha and his or her pack mate and not another. In the end, it just was and no one knew why.

Giving up, Greg put the card into his wallet just in case and focused on the paperwork, both pack and work related, that he needed to get done.

Maybe the why didn't matter and all that did matter was what Greg chose to do with what he'd been given.

~0~0~0~0~0~

Ann was already with Sherlock when Greg arrived at ten. They were bickering about whether or not Sherlock was going to take the files Bradstreet had brought with him to the clinic.

"You won't even be able to focus enough..." Ann was saying as Greg opened the door.

"How would you know?" Sherlock demanded, sounding for all the world like a petulant three-year-old. "I'm not going to spend three days staring at a wall. Not when there's work I could be doing."

"While you're in heat?" Ann demanded, incredulous. "There is no possible way..."

"Children," Greg said, loudly enough to get both their attention. Sherlock looked affronted and Ann gave Greg a look that clearly told him he'd pay for that later.

"The files..." Ann said, letting it hang.

Greg shrugged. "Let him take them, I doubt it will matter much."

The chances of Sherlock actually being able to work on them was more or less nil. Although if anyone could push heat aside for the lure of a mystery it would be Sherlock. Still, if nothing else it would provide a distraction when he was lucid enough for it and may just keep him from turning on the staff and getting himself thrown out.

Sherlock looked smugly pleased with his victory, even though he was clearly miserable.

Greg had been gone less than nine hours but the scent of Sherlock's heat had intensified during that time to be an almost tangible presence in the air of the room. Sherlock himself looked flushed and seemed to be sweating slightly. He fidgeted restlessly where he sat on the bed. Still too weak from detoxing to do much more than sit, the constant movement of his hands as he arranged and rearranged the pages of the file open before him said clearly that he'd be pacing if he could have.

He'd changed into a pair of jeans and a t-shirt Ann had bought for him. They made him look disturbingly young. His hair wasn't helping. He kept pushing at the curls that were long enough now to fall into his eyes.

"You need a haircut," Greg observed absently.

Sherlock muttered something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like "yes father". Ann rolled her eyes, dropping into a chair and picking up her book with the air of someone who intends to ignore everyone else in the room as pointedly as possible.

Greg went to get himself coffee.

It was only another fifteen minutes before a nurse arrived with Sherlock's masker. The kid didn't even look up when she came in and gave him the injection. Greg didn't need reminding just how used Sherlock was to the feel of needles puncturing his skin. He'd clearly used small gauge needles and took care to vary his injection sites so that there were few actual track marks and those few were mostly faint; barely scars at all. Only a few of the more recent ones were obvious, all in shades of red and pink depending on their progress toward healing.

Greg tried not to look at them and wished Ann had picked up a long-sleeved shirt. The newest ones, the ones that nearly cost Sherlock his life, looked almost black against the kid's too-pale skin.

Over the next forty minutes the scent in the air lost a great deal of its potency, but did nothing to diminish Sherlock's increasing agitation. Greg hoped they'd actually have time to get him to the Mech before his true heat began.

Around 10:30 Greg was called out by one of the nurses to sign the final paperwork for Sherlock's transfer and get last minute instructions from Dr. Carmichael.

A half an hour later, almost at eleven on the dot the ambulance arrived.

Taking an omega in the early stages of heat through a hospital was a great deal more of a production than Greg had anticipated. The part of the floor they were on was for beta and omega patients only. Still, all alpha staff had to be cleared from the area before they started. Escorted by security they were taken to a special patient's only elevator and instead of going through either the A&E or the public areas they were taken to a special private loading area in the back. There two female beta EMTs waited with an ambulance Greg was assured was specially insulated for this kind of thing. Greg was to ride with Sherlock and Ann was following in the car.

Sherlock had put on his coat but was sweating more than a little by the time they got into the ambulance and chucked it off immediately.

The EMTs had wanted to make him comfortable in the gurney but he insisted on sitting on one of the benches along the side instead.

As soon as he was strapped in, he dug back into the backpack Ann and pressed on him after the snow storm and which Bradstreet had recovered from Sherlock's alcove before anyone made off with it. He pulled out one of the files and began flipping through it again. Greg could tell that he was having trouble concentrating on it, but at least it kept him quite.

The ride to the Mech seemed interminable. It only lasted a bit more than an hour but Sherlock's restless agitation seemed to make it last a great deal longer.

It was just before they arrived at the Mech that Sherlock's scent changed. He'd been ramping up toward heat, but when started it was actually rather more sudden than Greg had been expecting. One moment he smelled the same as before and the next Greg could practically _*smell* _the lubrication he'd begun to produce.

Luckily, by then they were less than ten minutes from the clinic. Sherlock had given up even pretending to read the file before him and was simply shuffling and reshuffling the papers, squirming in his seat with increasing discomfort. He was sweating heavily by this point, his skin flushed. He kept pulling at his t-shirt as though the soft cotton irritated him. From what little Greg knew about heat, it probably was.

Greg had never shared a heat with an omega and had no omegas in his immediate family or, before Sherlock, in his pack. So, what he knew about heat was only what he remembered from sex ed in school for the most part. Well, that and what he saw in movie and television. He did remember though that an omega's skin became incredibly sensitive in the early stages of true heat. It made them more receptive to an alpha's touch and supposedly made orgasm easier to achieve. The down side was that having anything else against their skin, such as clothing, could become extremely uncomfortable.

"I hate this," Sherlock muttered, pulling once more at the shirt and wincing as he shifted in his seat again. It was the first time he's spoken in more than a half an hour.

"I'm sorry." Greg didn't know what else to say. It was clear that Sherlock was uncomfortable but there was nothing anyone could do until it passed. Usually, an omega without an alpha could be given medications to tone down the heat. Sometimes, they were even given sedatives so they would simply sleep though the worse of it. With Sherlock in the middle of detoxing, however, there was nothing anyone could do.

"You don't know what it's like," Sherlock hissed, starting to scratch at his arm over the scars and freshly healed injection sites. Greg reached over and grabbed his hand to stop him and got a snarl for his trouble. The sound startled the EMTs and the one in the passenger seat turned around to eye Sherlock warily. It wasn't entirely unknown for omegas in heat with no relief to become violent. Greg just held his gaze steadily.

"Do you want to end up with infected wounds?" he asked calmly.

Sherlock jerked his hand out of Greg's but dropped his gaze and didn't start scratching again.

Arrival at the clinic was a relief.

The Mech was surrounded by a high stone wall and a secured gate. It was old and ornate. The clinic had started as a country estate according to the information he'd been given about it and the security was the best money could buy. As a place where omegas went through heat they couldn't be too careful about keeping predatory alphas out. The EMTs radioed in when they arrived and the tall wrought iron gate opened at their approach.

To their right just inside the gate a large modern building stood, looking slightly out of place against the old stone of the walls. This was the facility's main offices and was as far as Greg would be going. While he was immune to Sherlock's scent that most definitely was not the case with any of the other omegas here.

The clinic itself was still out of sight behind a stand of well-grown trees.

The ambulance pulled up outside the offices and the EMT in the back with them opened the door for Greg to get out.

For a moment he stayed, wondering if he should say anything, do anything.

"If any interesting cases turn up I'll try not to solve them before you get out," Greg said finally.

Sherlock snorted. "As if you could solve anything _*really*_ interesting without me." There was humour in the look he gave Greg though and Greg grinned at him before climbing out. The EMT climbed back in and shut the door. Greg watched as the ambulance continued up the drive to where Sherlock would spend the next several days before turning to the offices to sign whatever needed to be signed and wait for Ann to pick him up.


	13. Chapter 13

_I am so very sorry for how long it look me to get this chapter done. Three weeks ago CJ, a dear friend of mine, was diagnosed with glioblastoma - a rare and EXTREMELY aggressive form of brain tumour. This week she will be going into hospice. She is in tremendous pain. In three weeks she has lost the ability to walk and now has great difficulty speaking. I've been spending a lot of my time with her husband of 15 years, simply trying to be there for him._

_CJ will be turning 46 this next week. She wont live to see spring._

_For as long as I've known her CJ has made a paper crane a day. She learned how to make them while living in Japan several years ago. Because of the legend that making 1,000 paper cranes can heal you, as soon as she feel ill all her friends started making paper cranes for her. We have made nearly 3,000 and will string them together and deck her hospice room in them. A tangible reminder that she is loved._

_We have also been reaching out to the wider online community asking people to make a crane or two for CJ and post a picture of it with the hashtag #CranesForCJ on Facebook, Tumblr or Twitter. If you have a moment please consider doing so. Her husband, Jim, and I are making sure she knows about the cranes made for her. Directions can be found all over the place. Just google it and you'll find a dozen or more good ones. If you don't have time, that's okay. But please pause to say a little prayer for her and for her husband._

_CJ is a wonderful person. She's always been all bounce and bubbles. Has always had a smile for everyone. She is loved dearly and will be badly missed._

_As things progress my story updates may be a little scattered. Obviously, the entire focus of my energy is with them during this difficult time. I'm sure you understand._

**Chapter 13**

Three days later a little after Greg had returned from his lunch break Jones appeared in his office doorway. His expression said it all.

"Where?" Greg asked, heart sinking.

"A condemned building about a mile from the last scene."

The day was warmer than the preceding several weeks, the sky crystal clear and the sun seeming to have some real heat to it at last. According to the weather reports it was only a false spring with more cold weather on the way. There was even the possibility of more snow to replace that which had long since melted. Still, Greg paused to enjoy the feel of the early afternoon sun for a moment before heading into the grime and darkness of the condemned building. Temporary the warmth may be but he was grateful for it nonetheless. The winter had been unusually cold and even a bit of temporary warmth was better than nothing.

Stepping into the dim interior of the building was like heading back into winter.

The redevelopment of this block of flats had been delayed for some time and there was plenty of evidence that the homeless had made good use of the shelter the building provided. Many of the flat doors were long gone and inside were mattresses, blankets, drug paraphernalia and other detritus attesting to its use by London's less fortunate citizens. The smell of unwashed bodies, human waste and rotting garbage was noxious but the scent was one Greg had been growing increasingly accustomed to over the last few months. Most of those who sheltered here had fled before the police arrived but a few still sat in their little domains, either defiantly guarding what little they could claim as their own or simply too far gone to care. Greg ignored them for the moment, simply nodding at Donovan and another of his constables in their direction. He was confident his team could deal with the preliminary interviews. Not that he expected they'd get anything out of these people. The homeless weren't the type to talk to cops readily. He could really have used Sherlock at a time like this. He may not appear to be aware of what tack even was but you could say this for him, he got the relevant information out of people.

When he reached the second floor an officer hurried quickly over to him.

"Mind the mess, sir," he said somewhat apologetically, motioning to the vomit on the floor. At least two people had been sick over by the door to the stairs, the overpowering stench of it was almost enough to blot out the other smells of the place and turned Greg's stomach. "The witness who found the body and one of the responding officers," the uniform said by way of explanation. "The victim's name was Agnes Liu. She was found by a packmate, one Debbie Freeborn."

Halfway down the hall a flat that still had its door was being guarded by another officer. Not far from him a woman leaned against the wall, her head resting against the stained and cracked plaster.

"That her?" Greg asked.

"Yes. No idea where the alpha is at this time. No evidence that this area is anyone's personal territory."

"Thanks." Nodding to Jones for him to get the rest of the necessary information from the officer, Greg headed toward the witness.

Debbie Freeborn looked up as Greg approached, eyeing him with dull wariness. She looked to be on the unpopular side of forty with the worn look of someone who had not had an easy life. She had clearly done her best to repair the damage to her heavily made up eyes but the evidence of tears was clear nonetheless. Her scent was that of an omega but an underlying chemical tang that spoke of prolonged drug use. The ankle breaker heels and a certain cut and tightness of her clothes suggested a pro to Greg.

"Debbie Freeborn?" he asked.

She just nodded and looked back toward the guarded door.

"I'm DI Lestrade," he told her, pulling out his ID. It was ignored so he simply pulled out his notebook instead. "Can you tell me what happened?"

Debbie shrugged, everything about her suggesting someone too worn down to care about much of anything anymore. "I came to check on Agnes when I found out she was alone here last night. Thought I'd see if I could get her to crash on someone's floor or something for a bit. I was too late." Her voice cracked a little on the last sentence which dropped to little more than a whisper. She took a breath before shaking her head, pushing ineffectually at the strands of limp brown hair that had escaped from her bun to hang around her face.

"She wasn't usually alone here then?" Greg asked.

"No."

Greg waited for a moment before pushing. "Who usually stayed with her?"

Debbie shrugged again. "Several of the girls come and go here. It's reasonably warm and, we thought, reasonably safe."

"Other girls?" Getting information out of this woman was a little like pulling teeth, but Greg had enormous reserves of patience from years of working with reluctant witnesses and a few months of working with Sherlock.

"Our pack," Debbie said reluctantly.

"Are you all female?" Greg asked. It was unusual to have a pack that was entirely one sex or another but it wasn't entirely unheard of.

"No," Debbie answered. "But mostly."

"Your alpha?"

"Jo Rossie." She gave him an address in a set of council flats in a neighbourhood only slightly better than this one. It was a better one though and Greg felt an instinctive disgust for an alpha who had a flat which would at least include heating and a door that locked while an omega under his protection was homeless and at risk across town.

"Told her she should have stayed there, stalker or no stalker," she muttered to herself.

"Stalker?" Greg demanded. All the victims had been stalked beforehand, of that they were certain. But this was the first he'd heard of one knowing she was being stalked.

Debbie sighed. "Agnes wanted off the streets, she wanted... better. For the last month she'd been living at this sort of shelter, halfway house. They'd been helping try to get clean and were going to help her get some education."

"When did she leave?"

"Two days ago." For the first time since the interview began Debbie looked at him instead of at the flat door behind which her packmate lay dead. "She said someone there was stalking her. I don't know much about it but that. Just that she was freaked out enough to think maybe she'd been wrong to try to leave the pack. That maybe she'd be safer back with us." Debbie snorted and looked away back toward the flat again. "I told her not to but she didn't listen."

There was little more to get from Debbie beside the names of the rest of her pack and of the shelter Agnes had fled from.

There was nothing for it at that point but to see what was left of Agnes Liu.

The main room of the flat was similar to the other Greg had passed on his way through the building. There were four mattresses, all stained and old. There were clear signs of drug use, enough to make Greg glad that Sherlock was safely tucked away at the clinic after all. A forensic technician was photographing the mess prior to collection but it was clear that the main focus of activity was in what would once have been the bedroom.

The stench of blood here was enough to eclipse all other smells.

A crimson lake dominated the room and liberally splattered the two mattresses and the scatter of other belongings which had all been pushed back to the edges of the space. The centre had been cleared by the killer. The body lay naked and spread eagled in the middle of the floor, her torso opened from diagram to crotch the flesh carefully pealed back and the organs removed.

Greg had been forced to do a great deal of studying of human anatomy lately and no longer needed anyone to tell him that the reproductive organs were missing but that all else was present and accounted for.

This time the killer had carefully placed the remaining organs against the sides of the body as though they were snuggled up to the place they'd come from. The intestines, on other hand, had been stretched out and laid out around the body and organs in an almost perfect circle. The outstretched tips of fingers and toes just touched the edges of the circle, making an x in the centre.

Greg was struck by a sudden visceral fear. This was the first time he'd seen the killer's work since learning that someone he cared about was a potential target and he had to remind himself that Sherlock was safe and far away from this lunatic's grasp. But God, how easy a target would Sherlock have been when high? And he had a sudden image of that horrible cubbyhole where he and Bradstreet had found Sherlock unconscious and vulnerable. Only this time it was to find _this_ inside. Sherlock spread out and cut open and dead.

He shook off both the image and the fear. He had a job to do and Agnes deserved nothing less than his undivided attention.

"It took some time to do this," Jones remarked, looking grey despite all he'd seen in his long career.

"He felt safe enough here to take his time," Greg answered. "At least they're dead by the time he does this to them."

"Thank God for small mercies," one of the tech muttered from where he was carefully documenting the scene.

While it was a surprise to receive a call from the Mech Clinic late that afternoon, it wasn't actually all that much of a shock. Sherlock, it seemed, was demanding to see him and making enough of a nuisance of himself with that demand that the clinic was calling Greg to deal with the situation. There was a distinct feeling of 'he's yours, you deal with him'.

Though it had only been three days, the worst of Sherlock's heat was over. He was still going through the last of his oestrus cycle and under normal circumstances it would have been at least another day before he would have been able to receive visitors. But then with Sherlock no circumstances were ever normal.

Greg's first instinct was to ignore Sherlock and focus on the case. Still, he had a responsibility here. So, he went vowing to himself that if Sherlock was just causing problems because he was bored Greg would make him _very_ sorry. Somehow.

Arriving again outside the incongruously modern building of the clinic's main offices, Greg was met by a nurse who took him to one of the visiting rooms. She was polite enough but there was a look he'd come to recognise from Sherlock's stay in hospital. Part frustration with having to deal with Sherlock at all and part pity for the impossible omega's alpha.

The visiting room was surprisingly large and furnished as an old fashion sitting room with floor to ceiling windows overlooking the stately gardens of the old manner house. Sherlock prowled the space as if the cosy room with its plush chairs and wood panelling were the most sadistic of prisons.

He wore a hospital robe over a pair of the pyjama bottoms and one of the loose t-shirts Ann had bought him. Though the worst of his heat was clearly over, the lingering scent of it still clung to him. From what Greg knew of heats the sexual need would have diminished by this point but wouldn't be entirely gone, just manageable. This was what was often referred to as the lazy part of the heat cycle, when the worst of the need driving the participants had eased and they could take the time to enjoy themselves.

Sherlock clearly wasn't enjoying anything at the moment.

When Greg entered he saw that Sherlock had pushed up the left sleeve of his robe and was absently, but no less industriously, scratching at his arm. The skin of the arm was red from repeated scratching, scabs having formed in one or two places where he'd scratched too hard. He'd just scratched one of those off and the spots of blood were bright against Sherlock's too pale skin.

Greg was across the room before he had time to think about it, grabbing Sherlock's wrist and trying to get a better look at the arm. Sherlock froze for a moment before jerking back as though struck.

"Don't you dare," he almost snarled.

Only then that Greg realised what he'd done. He hadn't noticed the small release of pheromones any more than he'd realised that he'd growled. Not a Command exactly. He hadn't ordered anything. It had, however, been a clear warning, alpha to herlot — or a person under that alpha's protection and authority. It had been a clear warning to stop, to hold still, to submit.

Instinct told Greg to hold on, to keep a hold until he'd got a good look at Sherlock's arm. It was unexpectedly difficult to let go and step back, holding his hands up to show he wasn't going to grab him again.

"Okay," Greg said in what he hoped was a calming tone. "Just let me..."

"I _knew_ this was a mistake," Sherlock interrupted, spinning away and resuming his pacing. He turned back and glared at Greg. "I don't care what the law says, I don't belong to you."

The words struck Greg like a blow to the gut. They were dangerously close to repudiation, the rejection of an alpha by a pack member, the dissolving of the bond between them. Except that only pack relationships based on mutual agreement could be dissolved. An intrinsic bond couldn't be repudiated. That knowledge was all that was keeping an unfamiliar panic from taking definite root. Still, it hurt.

"You were hurting yourself..." Greg began, trying to diffuse the situation.

"What I do to myself is my own damn business," Sherlock answered.

Greg would put up with a great deal, far more than most alphas, to accommodate Sherlock's peculiar sensibilities and need for independence. That, however, was too far, even for him.

"No, it isn't," Greg said sharply. "It's very much my business."

Sherlock opened his mouth to protest but Greg cut him off.

"You acknowledged me. Like it or not, I'm your alpha now and your wellbeing _is_ therefore _my _responsibility," he told him firmly. "I'm not going to try to run your life. I wouldn't want to run your life even if I thought I could. And I know damn well I couldn't. But the fact is that you'd be dead right now if Bradstreet and I hadn't come to find you. We performed CPR for nearly twenty minutes on you while we waited for the damn ambulance. It was _my_ breath that kept your damn lungs moving. So don't you _dare_ say it's none of my business. I fought to save your life and I'm sure as hell not going to stand here and do nothing while you cause yourself more harm."

Something in Greg's expression made Sherlock look away.

"I don't need a nursemaid," he muttered, sounding less angry and more petulant now. "I won't be treated like a child."

"Then stop acting like one."

Sherlock glared at him but turned away again, marching over to stare out the window with his arms crossed, looking for all the world like the angry child he claimed he wasn't.

For a moment, Greg allowed the silence to stand. It seemed to ring around them with the echoes of words Greg hadn't even realised he'd had stored up inside him until they were out. There was a heretofore unacknowledged part of him that was still angry over what Sherlock had done, so frightened that next time he'd be too late. If he had to fight Sherlock to keep the kid safe then that was what he'd do.

Finally, Greg picked up the bag he'd dropped when he'd jumped forward to see Sherlock's arm. He placed it on a table well within Sherlock's peripheral vision.

"Here's some clean pants and socks Ann picked up for you and I brought a couple more cold case files to keep you occupied."

Sherlock gave a soft snort. "Your wife is determined to dress me like some university student. There were jeans in the last bag of cloths and a t-shirt with some kind of logo on it."

Greg smiled slightly, gratefully allowing the anger of moments before to drain away. "Maybe she's hoping you'll take the hint," he said.

"Good God, no," Sherlock said with a mock shudder. "Uni was unbearably boring."

Greg wanted to ask a million questions. What school had Sherlock gone to, what had he been reading for, how long had he attended? This, unfortunately, wasn't the time or the place. Greg had to get back to the station as soon as he could manage it. At this point his first priority was to find out what had Sherlock so riled up and get him calmed down enough to not cause too much in the way of problems for the two remaining days he had here.

Greg perched on the arm of a chair and folded his arms. "So what was so damn important that you couldn't wait for a couple of days?"

Suddenly, Sherlock's entire demeanour changed, his face lighting up. He began to pace again, but this time the movements seemed to come from a simple inability to sit still rather than the caged animal prowling of before.

"I know what they had in common," he said excitedly.

Greg didn't bother with asking what Sherlock was talking about.

"Beyond being homeless female omegas, you mean?" Greg couldn't stop himself from saying. He wasn't going to admit, even to himself just how good it was to see Sherlock. It wasn't that Greg didn't think that the clinic was a safe place. But not being there to protect him when he _knew_ the omega was vulnerable to attack... Here and now he could admit to himself that that had been harder than he'd expected.

Sherlock snorted. "Yes, of course, other than that. Don't be pedestrian." He said the last word as if it were the worst insult known to man and Greg repressed a grin.

"I kept wondering why he chose them," Sherlock said, resuming his pacing. "Of all the omegas on the streets why the three of them?"

The urge to laugh faded. God, he'd forgotten Sherlock wouldn't know yet.

His expression, whatever it was, gave him away.

Sherlock stilled mid pace. "There's been a fourth," he said with absolute certainty.

Greg nodded.

"When? Where? Dear God, _why_ did I have to be stuck in here when he struck again? Your so-called forensics team will have destroyed all the evidence..." Sherlock shook his head. "Tell me everything."

Greg did, falling naturally into the clipped, clinical tones of a police report. Sherlock frowned, his eyes closed as he absorbed the information, his hands pressed together and held near his lips as if he were praying.

"What about this stalker?" he asked as Greg finished.

"I was going to go to the shelter and find out about that right away but I had a call that s_omeone_ couldn't wait two days to talk to me."

Sherlock snorted but didn't apologise. He opened his mouth to speak but Greg decided to direct him before he went off on some kind of tangent about how Greg should have known all he needed to know about Agnes' stalker by the way Debbie had told him or the name of the shelter she'd been living in.

"Does this new victim fit that pattern you came up with?" he asked.

"Yes," Sherlock said sounding pleased. "She fits it perfectly."

"And that pattern _is_?" Greg asked when Sherlock continued to stand there, eyes closed lost in whatever train of thought he was in.

"They were all omegas that didn't conform to society's expectations," Sherlock said. "And it wasn't just that they fail to do as they should. They did the opposite. The first two were loners, entirely on their own. Even in the 21st century that's not alright, not acceptable. No omega is allowed to be a loner." The bitterness returned but seemed to have another flavour to it, annoyance rather than regret. "Also, they both used their permutation to make money. No one seems to like prostitutes but you know as well as I do that omega prostitutes are particularly looked down on."

Greg nodded, it was true. There was a certain disgust people had for omegas who sold their bodies. "But Sophie was mated and Agnes did have a pack," he said.

"They still weren't as they should be," Sherlock said finally opening his eyes to spear Greg with one of his intense looks. "Sophie was the brains of that operation, everyone knew it. Shaun may have been the alpha but he was the follower, not the leader. He did as she told him to. In practice it was her that ran that pack and none of them even pretended otherwise."

Greg's brows rose. That_ was_ unusual. While it wasn't as uncommon as people liked to think for the omega to be the leader in a bonded pair, it was rare for the pack to not at least give lip service to the leadership of the alpha.

"And this new one," Sherlock continued. "She was also a prostitute as well as an addict. What's more she attempted to leave her pack, she turned her back on her alpha's control. That's not just socially unacceptable, it's shocking. Regardless of the alpha she should not have turned away without another alpha ready and able to take her in. Was there?"

Greg shook his head. "Not that anyone knows about."

Sherlock nodded looking annoyed. "I need to get back out there."

"Like hell," Greg said, the idea of Sherlock where this lunatic could get to him turned Greg's insides to ice. "You want to talk about an omega who doesn't conform to society's expectations? One that directly goes against them?"

"I'm not female," Sherlock snorted as though that put an end to the conversation.

"Which means nothing," Greg argued. "It's not that unusual for serial killers to switch between sexes in order to continue killing within the same permutation. It's particularly true in the case of those killing omegas and you know it."

"I can take care of myself," Sherlock said petulantly.

"Like you did earlier this week?" Greg demanded, but went on before Sherlock could argue. "Besides, everything we know about both Felicity and Sophie says that they could as well. Didn't stop this guy from killing them."

"I need to see that crime scene," Sherlock said, clearly deciding to change tack.

"I'll bring you the full report as soon as I have it completed," Greg said. "And depending on how you're doing in a couple of days when you are discharged from here maybe we'll _both_ go."

Sherlock looked less than pleased but dove into the bag Greg had brought without saying any more.


	14. Chapter 14

_The whole rest of this story is dedicated to my incomparable beta, brainstorming partner, and cheer leader - Coian. Without whom this story would have been shorter and a hell of a lot less interesting, not to mention worse spelled and decidedly harder to follow._

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 14<strong>

Agnes Liu had been twenty-two years old, making her neither the youngest nor the oldest of the victims. She had been arrested three times, twice for prostitution and once for possession. After her third arrest a social worker for the court had secured her a place at Abbott House, a shelter where she had been part of their residential recovery program for her addiction to methamphetamines. She had been there for nearly two months and had been making excellent progress until she'd left two days before. Now she was dead with no chance at the life she'd wanted for herself. One free of drugs and off the streets.

Her social worker was an overwhelmed woman who, though upset by Agnes' death and the manner of it, was simply too overworked to know much more than the fact that she'd left Abbott house without notifying anyone about it.

So it was to Abbott House Greg headed the next morning, hoping to find someone who knew more about her stalker. At first he was met with little more than blank stares and the information that Agnes had left and they didn't know where she was. The director was out of town and without his authorisation they couldn't and wouldn't say any more.

Finally, it was suggested that the nurse who had treated her was there that morning and Greg might try talking to him.

The clinic attached to the shelter was little more than a single room over-crowded with an exam table, a chair, and the other standard equipment of any doctor's office. The door to it was open but Greg could see that the nurse had someone in with him when he arrived. So he waited just out of earshot for the patient to leave. The elderly woman finally hobbled out, her slightly unfocused gaze travelling over Greg without apparently seeing him.

The nurse appeared in the door way and seemed startled to see Greg there. He was a beta of middle height who had the slightly harassed look many of those who worked in underfunded institutions had. Then his eyes narrowed and Greg knew the moment he'd been made as a cop.

He held out his warrant card as he came over.

"DI Lestrade of the CID," he said. "Can I ask you a few questions?"

The man looked at the warrant card for a moment as though trying to figure out how to tell if it was fake or not before shrugging.

"Come on in," he said waving Greg into the clinic. This time, he shut the door behind him. "Who did what?" he asked with a slightly resigned smile as he motioned for Greg to take the room's only chair. He himself hopped up on the examination table and seemed caught between amusement and chagrin.

"You have a lot of trouble like that here?" Greg asked, taking the offered seat.

The nurse shrugged. "Not as much as you might think but the place is still full of homeless drug addicts."

Greg nodded before taking out his notebook. "Your name?"

"Oh," the man seemed a bit flustered. "Sorry about that. Alex Cartwright."

"And did you treat someone staying here by the name of Agnes Liu?"

"Agnes?" That clearly surprised him. "Sure. She left though. What was it... two, three days ago?"

"And before that?" Greg asked.

Alex shrugged. "She was here for a couple of months or something like that. What's going on? Is she in some kind of trouble?"

Greg ignored the question for the moment. "Do you know why she left the shelter?"

"Well..." Alex frowned. "Look I know you have a job to do and all but there's still such a thing as patient/doctor confidentiality. I know I'm only a nurse but it still applies. I don't think I can break that without like a court order or subpoena or whatever."

Perfect, Greg thought. His gut told him that here was finally someone who knew something.

"Agnes Liu was found dead yesterday morning," Greg told him and watched shock cross the man's features.

Alex said nothing for a moment before shaking his head. "Just... hold on a moment."

He got down off the examination table and walked the two steps to the tiny sink. Grabbing a paper cup from a dispenser he poured himself some water and drank it down before turning back.

"I heard on the news," he said in a careful tone, "that there had been another one of those ripper wanna-be killings yesterday."

He let the statement hang between them. When Greg nodded he shut his eyes.

"Jesus Christ. Jesus fucking Christ."

He tossed the paper cup into the trash before getting up on the exam table again, this time with his elbows resting on his knees, staring down at the floor.

"How well did you know Miss Liu?" Greg asked after he judged the man had sufficiently collected himself to answer.

"I don't know," Alex said softly. "I couldn't say I knew her well exactly. I was helping to monitor her as she went through withdrawal. I saw her at least every week. We didn't talk about much other than her treatment though. I don't know who her friends were or anything like that. But... but I think I got a sense of her as person, if you understand me. She was... sweet. She always tried to have a smile for you even when she felt like crap, you know?"

"Do you know why she left the shelter?" When Alex failed to answer Greg pressed. "I know you have to protect the privacy of your patients..."

"No," Alex cut him off. "I mean, yes I do. But... Well, she's dead. There's not a whole lot more I can do for her, except maybe tell you whatever I can." He looked up at Greg with a look that was both sad and accepting. "She's your responsibility now, I guess."

"She is," Greg agreed.

Alex took a deep breath and straightened up. "Right," he said. "Well, about three weeks ago I noticed that she was really jumpy, always looking over her shoulder. Paranoia is often part of the withdrawal symptoms from meth... Wait, did you know she was dealing with an addiction to meth?"

"Yeah, I already knew," Greg said reassuringly.

"Right," Alex said before staring off at the wall across form him. "Well, she was acting kind of paranoid and that had me worried. She was already three weeks into withdrawal. You don't usually get paranoia that late and she hadn't exhibited any signs of it before then. Still, that kind of thing happens sometimes. I asked her about it and she said that someone had been in her room over the last couple of days. She said she could tell because things weren't quite where she'd left them. Like someone had been going through her stuff but hadn't put things back exactly where they had been before." Alex shook his head and looked sadly at Greg. "I didn't believe her. I thought it was just part of the withdrawal."

Greg nodded his understanding.

"Then it kept happening." Alex shrugged. "She started doing things like running string from her door handle to things or putting a matchstick in between her door and the wall. One day she put flower all over the floor of the room to show us that this was really happening and not something she was making up. It clearly showed that someone _was_ getting in. She was starting to freak out about it. We did what we could, she even talked to the director about what could be done but the fact was no one knew who was doing it and it didn't seem to be happening to anyone else."

"You never thought to call the police?" Greg asked.

Alex shook his head. "That kind of trouble we don't need around here." At Greg's look, Alex sighed. "Look a lot of the people here, they have histories. They've been through the system before. We start bringing the cops in and some of them might not stay. These are people who have a real chance if they're willing to work at it. The last thing we want to do is drive them away." He stopped and slumped forward again. "So instead we let someone drive Agnes away," he said softly. "And now she's dead because of it."

"Hindsight is always 20/20," Greg said, feeling a little bad for the guy. "You couldn't have known this would happen."

"I know," Alex sighed.

"Did you ever find out who was responsible?" Greg asked.

"No," Alex muttered, frustration clear in his tone. "That's why she left. I saw her just the day before. I told her not to go, told her to wait it out just a little longer and we'd figure this out... But anyway. That's all I know really."

"Could just anyone have got access to her room?"

"That's the thing," Alex said. "No they couldn't. Whoever it was had to have been staying here too. Or at least visiting often enough to not seem out of place to the staff. But Abbott House runs so many programs that people are in and out all the time and all the break-ins happened during the day when there were people all over the place. Still, if someone had been going back into that area a lot who didn't belong there people would have noticed."

"Who left after her?" Greg asked. "Anyone in particular who left after Agnes but before she died?"

Alex bit his lip seeming to think hard. "I don't..." He stopped then and Greg saw his eyes widen as if he'd thought of something. After a moment he looked back at Greg, his gaze suddenly focused in a way it hadn't been before. "Look, I... I'm fine with talking to you about Agnes. But you have to understand, my other patients... that's different. I don't think I could say anymore here without the director's okay."

There was something, though, Greg thought. The man had clearly thought of something and just as clearly _wanted_ to tell Greg what it was.

"Get a warrant," Alex said earnestly. "The director isn't going to do anything unless he has all the legal ducks in a row, you know?"

Greg hesitated. "Even a hint?" he asked, not pretending he wasn't aware of just how badly the man before him wanted to give in.

But Alex shook his head.

"Get the warrant, Detective Inspector."

~ 0 ~ 0 ~ 0 ~

One of the things that had most concerned Greg lately had been the question of 'what next?' as far as Sherlock was concerned. The day after Sherlock had been transferred to the Mech Clinic Greg had arrived at his office to find a large envelope on his desk. Inside was the information on three rehab clinics in and around London that could handle someone like Sherlock. Well, they could handle an omega with a severe drug addiction who had recently overdosed. Whether they could handle _this particular_ omega was another question entirely. All three where private, exclusive, didn't generally take NHS patients and were _way_ the hell out of his price range.

Greg didn't have to wonder where the information had come from any more than he had to wonder who would be footing the bill for any centre he choose. Sherlock could say what he liked about his brother but Greg was starting to like him. He was odd as hell, sure. On the other hand, he _was_ Sherlock's brother and so Greg wouldn't have expected him to be normal. He certainly didn't show his concern for his brother's welfare in anything like a conventional manner. Nonetheless, he obviously was concerned and was doing what he could to ensure that Sherlock got the help he needed.

The problem was that he was clearly actually expected to choose one of these facilities and somehow get Sherlock there. All attempts to discuss the possibility of rehab while Sherlock was still in hospital had been thoroughly ignored by the addict himself. Of course, he hadn't actually said he _wouldn't_ go to one. He had simply refused to discuss the matter at all.

Over the last several days, Greg and Ann had spent several dinners discussing the pros and cons of various courses of action. Eventually, it was Ann who had decided which facility looked the best to her and had called them herself.

It turned out that Colwith Rehabilitation Centre had already been contacted about the possibility of having Sherlock at their facility and had a room waiting for him.

After getting off the phone with them Ann couldn't seem to stop laughing for nearly twenty minutes. Greg hadn't thought it was that funny really but what could you do. With no way to get a hold of Sherlock while in the Mech — they really needed to think about investing in a mobile for him — Greg decided in the end that he'd just take Sherlock to Colwith and see what happened.

Two days after Agnes' death Greg drove through the gates of the Mech for the last time. At least, he hoped so. Sherlock was already ready to go and was standing at the front doors of the administration building arguing loudly with a nurse who felt he should be waiting in one of the visiting rooms so that the doctor could discuss things with his alpha before he was discharged.

Greg snorted. This woman clearly hadn't run across Sherlock before during his stay here or she would have known better.

Seeing Greg, Sherlock picked up the bag at his feet and headed over toward the car.

"If you'd taken any longer I was going to call a cab," he muttered petulantly. "Let's get out of here."

"Good luck getting anywhere without the keys," Greg said pleasantly. "I'm talking to the doctor first."

Sherlock scowled. "She doesn't have anything worth saying."

Greg just shrugged and headed into the offices. The doctor who was waiting to speak to him had more to say about Sherlock's uncooperative attitude than about anything else. The pamphlets she gave him on withdrawal were better made and had more glossy pictures than those given to him in hospital. However, they didn't contain much in the way of new information. There were one or two alarmist ones about the special dangers of addiction in omegas, but that didn't seem to be anything more than the usual blathering by conservatives upset by the idea of omegas being anything other than baby factories.

When he got back to the car he found a disgruntled Sherlock already sitting in the passenger's seat, apparently texting someone — on Greg's phone.

"Hey," Greg objected, snatching it back as he climbed in. "Who the hell are you contacting?"

"Bradstreet," Sherlock said. "I need to find out more about one of the cases you brought me and since you're here instead of at the yard, I thought she'd be better able to get at the information I need than you would."

"She's working on her own cases, Sherlock," Greg sighed. "She doesn't have time to do you research for you."

"Fine," Sherlock answered. "Then let's head to the yard now."

Greg didn't answer. He just tossed the pamphlets on the evils of addiction in omegas onto Sherlock's lap before starting the car.

"You really can't be serious."

"You aren't worried about the fact that some of the drugs may linger in your ovaries and hurt your future children?" Greg asked sweetly.

Sherlock snorted. "Yes, of course. Because children are what I'm really worried about. Right up there with finding a nice alpha to slave over a stove for."

Greg laughed. "If you were slaving over a stove I'd be scared of what came off of it."

He glanced at Sherlock who gave him a decidedly evil grin. "I think that would be wise."

Giving in Greg tossed his phone back at Sherlock. "Just make sure Jane realises that it's you demanding things of her and not me, okay?"

"Of course," Sherlock muttered. "She wouldn't give me the right information if she thought I was you."

Greg had no idea why that was, but didn't bother asking.

~ 0 ~ 0 ~ 0 ~

It wasn't until they were actually pulling up outside of the Colwith Rehabilitation Centre that Sherlock bothered to look up from his incessant use of the phone. When he wasn't involved in a complicated discussion/argument with Bradstreet he was using up Greg's data for the month at an alarming rate. Perhaps he should have gone with the unlimited plan Ann had suggested.

Sherlock's eyes narrowed at the building as Greg slowed before it and then narrowed farther as they drove around the back of the building to the parking area. He eyed the gracious Georgian façade as though it were a snake he expected to bite him.

"Did Mycroft pick this place?" he demanded suspiciously. It was interesting that he didn't bother to ask where they were or why. But then at this point Greg supposed that it would take a lot less than Sherlock's deductive abilities to figure it out.

"No," Greg answered parking the car and turning it off. "Ann did."

Sherlock looked slightly startled by that information as though the idea of Ann having chosen a rehabilitation facility for him was strange.

"You'll have a room to yourself," Greg told him. "And since you're still in the city, after the first week you can actually go places and do things as long as there's no evidence that you're using."

"And what am I supposed to do with myself for a _week_?" Sherlock asked, sounding only slightly mollified.

"Come see," Greg said.

The inside of the Colwith had kept much of the original building and Greg suspected that it was probably a protected structure. While looking through the information on it Ann had complained that it was more luxurious than the hotel where they'd spend their honeymoon. She'd stopped complaining when she saw the cost. Although her eyes bulged a bit. The man at the reception desk was dressed in a suit. When he said that Ann had already been by to deliver Sherlock's things Sherlock gave Greg a suspicious glance. Greg just smiled at him and motioned for him to follow the man in the suit who was telling them about the spa facilities available on site, the group therapy, meal times, and so on.

Sherlock's room was on the third floor and he could see over the smaller buildings across the street to the river beyond. Decorated in greys and browns it was dominated by a large bed. By the widows a couple of chairs sat with a little table between them and opposite the bed was a desk with a bookshelf next to it. The door to the en suite stood open to show the gracious amenities in there as well.

The desk was what caught Sherlock's attention. Placed before one of the windows it was a large wooden affair that looked in-keeping with the old-fashion feel of the place. This one, however, had a _very_ thick stack of police files on it. A map of London had been put on the wall near it and on the bookshelf alongside the books on recovery and a few of the current best-sellers put there by the facility Ann had placed books on crime, criminology and forensics.

Walking over Sherlock picked up the note Ann had left on top of the stack of files.

_I dare you to solve this lot in a week._

_- Ann_

Sherlock looked at Greg who only grinned at him before throwing back his head and laughing. "Tell your wife, she's on, Lestrade."


End file.
